The extent to which object identification is influenced by the background of the scene is still controversial. On the one hand, the global context of a scene might be considered as an ultimate representation, suggesting that object processing is performed almost systematically before scene context analysis. Alternatively, the gist of a scene could be extracted sufficiently early to be able to influence object categorization. It is thus essential to assess the processing time of scene context. In the present study, we used a go/no-go rapid visual categorization task in which subjects had to respond as fast as possible when they saw a "man-made environment", or a "natural environment", that was flashed for only 26 ms. "Man-made" and "natural" scenes were categorized with very high accuracy (both around 96%) and very short reaction times (median RT both around 390 ms). Compared with previous results from our group, these data demonstrate that global context categorization is remarkably fast: (1) it is as fast as object categorization [Fabre-Thorpe, M., Delorme, A., Marlot, C., & Thorpe, S. (2001). A limit to the speed of processing in ultra-rapid visual categorization of novel natural scenes. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 13(2), 171-180]; (2) it is faster than contextual categorization at more detailed levels such as sea, mountain, indoor or urban contexts [Rousselet, G. A., Joubert, O. R., & Fabre-Thorpe, M. (2005). How long to get to the "gist" of real-world natural scenes? Visual Cognition, 12(6), 852-877]. Further analysis showed that the efficiency of contextual categorization was impaired by the presence of a salient object in the scene especially when the object was incongruent with the context. Processing of natural scenes might thus involve in parallel the extraction of the global gist of the scene and the concurrent object processing leading to categorization. These data also suggest early interactions between scene and object representations compatible with contextual influences on object categorization in a parallel network.

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BackgroundSince the pioneering study by Rosch and colleagues in the 70s, it is commonly agreed that basic level perceptual categories (dog, chair…) are accessed faster than superordinate ones (animal, furniture…). Nevertheless, the speed at which objects presented in natural images can be processed in a rapid go/no-go visual superordinate categorization task has challenged this “basic level advantage”.Principal FindingsUsing the same task, we compared human processing speed when categorizing natural scenes as containing either an animal (superordinate level), or a specific animal (bird or dog, basic level). Human subjects require an additional 40–65 ms to decide whether an animal is a bird or a dog and most errors are induced by non-target animals. Indeed, processing time is tightly linked with the type of non-targets objects. Without any exemplar of the same superordinate category to ignore, the basic level category is accessed as fast as the superordinate category, whereas the presence of animal non-targets induces both an increase in reaction time and a decrease in accuracy.Conclusions and SignificanceThese results support the parallel distributed processing theory (PDP) and might reconciliate controversial studies recently published. The visual system can quickly access a coarse/abstract visual representation that allows fast decision for superordinate categorization of objects but additional time-consuming visual analysis would be necessary for a decision at the basic level based on more detailed representations.

BackgroundSonic hedgehog (Shh) signaling plays a crucial role in growth and patterning during embryonic development, and also in stem cell maintenance and tissue regeneration in adults. Aberrant Shh pathway activation is involved in the development of many tumors, and one of the most affected Shh signaling steps found in these tumors is the regulation of the signaling receptor Smoothened by the Shh receptor Patched. In the present work, we investigated Patched activity and the mechanism by which Patched inhibits Smoothened.Methodology/Principal FindingsUsing the well-known Shh-responding cell line of mouse fibroblasts NIH 3T3, we first observed that enhancement of the intracellular cholesterol concentration induces Smoothened enrichment in the plasma membrane, which is a crucial step for the signaling activation. We found that binding of Shh protein to its receptor Patched, which involves Patched internalization, increases the intracellular concentration of cholesterol and decreases the efflux of a fluorescent cholesterol derivative (BODIPY-cholesterol) from these cells. Treatment of fibroblasts with cyclopamine, an antagonist of Shh signaling, inhibits Patched expression and reduces BODIPY-cholesterol efflux, while treatment with the Shh pathway agonist SAG enhances Patched protein expression and BODIPY-cholesterol efflux. We also show that over-expression of human Patched in the yeast S. cerevisiae results in a significant boost of BODIPY-cholesterol efflux. Furthermore, we demonstrate that purified Patched binds to cholesterol, and that the interaction of Shh with Patched inhibits the binding of Patched to cholesterol.Conclusion/SignificanceOur results suggest that Patched may contribute to cholesterol efflux from cells, and to modulation of the intracellular cholesterol concentration. This activity is likely responsible for the inhibition of the enrichment of Smoothened in the plasma membrane, which is an important step in Shh pathway activation.

Plasma etching processes at the 22 nm technology node and below will have to satisfy multiple stringent scaling requirements of microelectronics fabrication. To satisfy these requirements simultaneously, significant improvements in controlling key plasma parameters are essential. Pulsed plasmas exhibit considerable potential to meet the majority of the scaling challenges, while leveraging the broad expertise developed over the years in conventional continuous wave plasma processing. Comprehending the underlying physics and etching mechanisms in pulsed plasma operation is, however, a complex undertaking; hence the full potential of this strategy has not yet been realized. In this review paper, we first address the general potential of pulsed plasmas for plasma etching processes followed by the dynamics of pulsed plasmas in conventional high-density plasma reactors. The authors reviewed more than 30 years of academic research on pulsed plasmas for microelectronics processing, primarily for silicon and conductor etch applications, highlighting the potential benefits to date and challenges in extending the technology for mass-production. Schemes such as source pulsing, bias pulsing, synchronous pulsing, and others in conventional high-density plasma reactors used in the semiconductor industry have demonstrated greater flexibility in controlling critical plasma parameters such as ion and radical densities, ion energies, and electron temperature. Specifically, plasma pulsing allows for independent control of ion flux and neutral radicals flux to the wafer, which is key to eliminating several feature profile distortions at the nanometer scale. However, such flexibility might also introduce some difficulty in developing new etching processes based on pulsed plasmas. Therefore, the main characteristics of continuous wave plasmas and different pulsing schemes are compared to provide guidelines for implementing different schemes in advanced plasma etching processes based on results from a particularly challenging etch process in an industrial reactor.

Whereas most scientists agree that scene context can influence object recognition, the time course of such object/context interactions is still unknown. To determine the earliest interactions between object and context processing, we used a rapid go/no-go categorization task in which natural scenes were briefly flashed and subjects required to respond as fast as possible to animal targets. Targets were pasted on congruent (natural) or incongruent (urban) contexts. Experiment 1 showed that pasting a target on another congruent background induced performance impairments, whereas segregation of targets on a blank background had very little effect on behavior. Experiment 2 used animals pasted on congruent or incongruent contexts. Context incongruence induced a 10% drop of correct hits and a 16-ms increase in median reaction times, affecting even the earliest behavioral responses. Experiment 3 replicated the congruency effect with other subjects and other stimuli, thus demonstrating its robustness. Object and context must be processed in parallel with continuous interactions possibly through feed-forward co-activation of populations of visual neurons selective to diagnostic features. Facilitation would be induced by the customary co-activation of "congruent" populations of neurons whereas interference would take place when conflictual populations of neurons fire simultaneously.

Articles you may be interested inInfluence of the reactor wall composition on radicals' densities and total pressure in Cl 2 inductively coupled plasmas: II. During silicon etching Level set approach to simulation of feature profile evolution in a high-density plasma-etching system Anisotropic etching of silicon gates is a key step in today's integrated circuit fabrication. For sub-100 nm gate dimensions, one of the main issues is to precisely control the shape of the etched feature. This requires a detailed knowledge of the various physicochemical mechanisms involved in anisotropic plasma etching. Since silicon etching in high-density plasmas is strongly ion assisted, the identities of the ions bombarding the wafer is a key parameter that governs the etch rates and the etched profiles. In the present article, mass spectrometry has been used to investigate the chemical composition of the ion flux bombarding the reactor walls of an industrial inductively coupled plasma used for 200-mm-diam silicon wafer processing. The plasma chemistries investigated are HBr/Cl 2 /O 2 and HBr/Cl 2 /O 2 /CF 4 mixtures optimized for sub-100 nm gate processes. Quantitative ion mass spectra show that under those conditions the ion flux contains up to 50% of SiCl X Br Y ϩ (X,Y ϭ0 -2) ions, although Cl ϩ , Cl 2 ϩ , and Br ϩ ions were expected to be the predominant species. This observation can be explained by the combination of two well-accepted phenomena that are discussed in detail. The impact of the surprisingly large amount of ionized silicon-based etch products on silicon etching mechanisms are discussed.

One major challenge in plasma etching processes for integrated circuit fabrication is to achieve a good wafer-to-wafer repeatability. This requires a perfect control of the plasma chamber wall conditions. For silicon etching processes, which deposit SiO y Cl z layers on the chamber walls, this is achieved by cleaning the interior surfaces of the plasma chamber with an SF 6 -based plasma after each wafer is etched. However, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy analysis of the reactor wall surfaces shows that the inner parts of the Al 2 O 3 chamber are strongly fluorinated (formation of Al-F bonds) during the SF 6 plasma. At the same time the AlF x layer is sputtered from some parts of the chamber (mostly from the roof, which is bombarded by high energy ions), and AlF redeposition is observed on other parts of the reactor body. Hence, the cleaning process of the reactor leaves AlF residues on the chamber wall on its own. This leads to several issues including flake off of Al x F y particles on the wafer and process drifts (due both to the progressive growth of AlF material on the SiO 2 windows and to the release of F atoms from the chamber walls during the etching process). This indicates that a strategy other than dry-cleaning the Al 2 O 3 chamber walls in fluorine-based plasmas should be found. In this paper we have investigated two different strategies. The first one consists of replacing Al 2 O 3 covering the chamber walls by another material for the chamber walls inner coating. In particular, we have investigated the surface modification of several types of organic polymers (Teflon, Parylene and carbon-rich polymers), when exposed to SF 6 -based plasmas. We show that these materials can be reset to their original condition after exposure to a dry-cleaning process because carbon containing polymers are slowly etched away by the SF 6 /O 2 plasma. This suggests that the replacement of the conventional Al 2 O 3 chamber wall material by a carbon-coated liner should be possible. Alternatively, we also propose a powerful strategy for conditioning and cleaning an Al 2 O 3 reactor, in which a thin carbon-rich layer is deposited on the reactor walls by a short plasma step prior to any etching process. After etching, the SiO y Cl z layer deposited on the carbon layer during a silicon gate etch step can be cleared with an appropriate plasma, and the carbon layer removed by an O 2 plasma, thus resetting the reactor walls to their initial state. Using this strategy the etching process always starts under the same chamber walls conditions (a carbon-rich wall) and is thus reproducible. At the same time, the issues associated with AlF deposits are prevented because the carbon-coated layer protects the Al 2 O 3 chamber walls, and there is no fluorine released into the plasma. Finally, we will show that the etching profiles of the silicon gates and the selectivity towards the thin gate oxides are excellent in the carbon-coated chamber. This strategy is thus promising for future metal gate etching applications.