neuroscience
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Scientists predict human thought in real time, nearly every time
Neuroscientists from the University of Washington have decoded brain signals in real-time and with astounding accuracy, as revealed in a recent study published in PLOS Computational Biology. Researchers attached electrodes to the temporal lobes of seven epilepsy patients for roughly one week -- the implants were part of a program that aimed to locate the sources of these patients' seizures, but while the electrodes were active, the patients also participated in this brain-wave study. Researchers were in the neighborhood, after all.
ICYMI: Reading a fly's mind, real Minecraft phone and more
#fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-44671{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-44671, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-44671{width:570px;display:block;}try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-44671").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: Neuroscientists figured out what fruit flies are thinking with fluorescent molecules. Minecraft now has an internal smartphone that can be used to text and call people within the game. And this new smart flossing product that gives a strip of floss once the button is pushed also serves to shame your partner for not flossing with lights that come on if a daily cleaning is missed.
LED implants could ease your pain
One day, eliminating pain may just be a matter of flicking on a light. Scientists have shown that you can implant LEDs that stop neurons from firing and cut out pain reception. The current technique (tested in mice) requires altering the neurons' DNA -- you couldn't just stick them in anyone. They're soft, however, and safe enough that you can leave them under the skin for long periods of time without limiting motion or wrecking tissue.
Simulated brain cells give robot instinctive navigation skills
A team of researchers at Singapore's Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) announced on Wednesday that they had taught a robot how to navigate on its own, in much the same way that humans and other animals do. They reportedly accomplished this feat by digitally replicating two types of neurons that help animals geolocate naturally.
Lasers help prove parts of the brain 'sleep' while you're awake
Have you ever spaced out in the middle of a conversation without dozing off completely? MIT scientists now have a better idea why: only part of your brain is sleeping while the rest stays awake. Neuroscientists always suspected that, but the MIT team proved it in mice by using "optogenetics" to stimulate a part of the brain associated with sleep. They showed that the "thalamic reticular nucleus" (TRN) not only triggers slow sleep waves across the brain, but controls individual regions as well. The research could lead to safer anesthetic techniques and improved drugs for insomniacs.
Neuroscientists accurately predict intelligence with an fMRI scan
If fingerprints can identify individual people, imagine what a brain-print could reveal -- namely, how you think and how intelligent you are. Neuroscientists studied fMRI scans of 126 patients in the Human Connectome Project, a consortium helping to map the human brain, and found consistent connections that accurately predicted "fluid intelligence," or abstract reasoning. Their findings were published today in the journal Nature. Researchers found that the more certain regions of the brain spoke to each other, the more likely a person was to quickly process information and make inferences, Yale grad student and study co-author Emily Finn told Wired. For example, a strong connection between the frontal and parietal lobes, two areas involved in high-level functions, accurately predicted a high fluid-intelligence score.
Easy-to-make mini brains will help medical research
If you want to study the effects of drugs or transplants on the brain without operating on the real thing, you typically have to break out some microelectronics and build a model yourself. Not exactly convenient or cheap, is it? If Brown University scientists have their way, however, just about any lab could make some simulated brain matter of their own. They've developed a technique that creates a miniature brain (really, a bundle of electrically active neurons) by extracting cells with a centrifuge and seeding a cell culture. So long as you have two to three weeks and 25 cents' worth of material, you'll have a complex, three-dimensional neural network to tinker with.
For the first time, a paraplegic has walked without a robotic suit
A paraplegic has walked without robotics using his own brain waves, thanks to research done at Southern California's UC Irvine. Scientists used a computer to "link" 28-year-old Adam Fritz's brain to his legs over a Bluetooth connection, bypassing the severed region of his spinal cord. An EEG then picked up signals from his brain, which were relayed by a "brain-control interface" (BCI) computer to electrodes on his knee, triggering walking movements. Though Fritz was supported and only walked haltingly for 12 feet, the research is being heralded as a milestone -- so far, paralyzed patients have only be able to walk using suits like that from Ekso Bionics.
Scientists stimulate mouse brains with wireless 'charger'
For reasons we'll soon explain, turning on a light inside a mouse's head can help scientists map brain function. It's easy to implant an LED in a mouse's brain, but how to power it? Until now, the mice either needed to be tethered to a fiberoptic cable or fitted with heavy wireless charging devices. However, Stanford scientists managed to build an implant that's not only lightweight, but able to receive consistent amounts of wireless energy.
GE's Neuro VR experience takes you inside a musician's brain
"Welcome to the complex universe inside Reuben's head." A mysterious voice boomed through the headphones. With an Oculus headset strapped on my face for GE's Neuro VR experience, I found myself moving through British musician Reuben Wu's mind. Bright pink globes and interlinked pipelines flashed before me. What was meant to be anatomical, felt more industrial. It was underwhelming. But soon, the globes made way for a dark abyss and I watched as the neurons inside his brain came to life. They gently sparked and burst into little bolts of neon lightning, replicating the magical, interconnected workings of the complex organ.
Scientists work out how to wire up your brain
Imagine a future where neurological disorders are cured with a single injection into the top of your skull. That's the expectation placed on the shoulders of Charles Lieber, a Harvard chemist who has developed a groundbreaking technology that has the potential to change medicine. The process involves building a tiny fishing net out of conducting threads that can support microscopic sensors across its surface. It's so small that you can use a regular-sized but stronger needle to inject it via a tiny drill hole straight onto the brain. Then, this mesh begins to unfurl and sit on the top of your noggin, shifting around as your grey matter does normally.
Thync's mood-changing wearable arrives for $299
How eager are you to calm down (or psych yourself up) at a moment's notice? If the answer is "enough to buy a fairly expensive gadget," your solution is now within reach. Thync has launched its namesake mood-changing wearable at the hefty price of $299. That's a lot to pay simply to feel different, but the company is betting that its funky, triangular neurosignalling device is just the ticket if you tend to be stressed or lethargic at inopportune moments. Use the phone-controlled device and it should either relax or revitalize you for up to an hour, with "carry-over impacts" lasting for hours longer. The hardware worked well enough in our early hands-on, so it might be worth giving Thync a shot if you're often out-of-sorts -- it may well beat drinking coffee or beer to achieve the same effects.
Obama's 2013 'BRAIN' initiative results in remote-controlled mice
The first results to stem from President Barack Obama's 2013 "Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies" initiative are in, Reuters reports. As noted in the journal Neuron, scientists were able to manipulate the brain circuitry of lab mice, making them move, stay still, eat or leave their bowls of food behind. This was accomplished through the use of DREADDs, "designer receptors exclusively activated by designer drugs." The DREADDs system uses genetically engineered brain neurons to create custom receptors that lock into manmade molecules, activating whichever neuron scientists target. The DREADD method is a noninvasive form of behavior control, first introduced about a decade ago as a way to turn neurons on or off -- the newest DREADDs are the first to be able to do both.
Rat brains are basically wired up like miniature internets
Drawing on forty years of peer-reviewed research, a team of researchers from the University of Southern California have generated the world's first "wiring diagram" of a rat's central nervous system. And, as it turns out, their brain structures are uncannily similar to the internet's physical architecture. What's more, this could help us better understanding of our own neural organization. "The cerebral cortex is like a mini-Internet," USC professor and corresponding author of the study Larry Swanson said in a statement. "The Internet has countless local area networks that then connect with larger, regional networks and ultimately with the backbone of the Internet. The brain operates in a similar way."
Thync's mood-changing wearable made me happy and frustrated
It's eight-thirty in the morning. I'm sitting in a hotel suite in Las Vegas. My colleague Dan Cooper is sitting next to me in near silence. Both of us are in the same room, with the same silence, but we're feeling very different things. I have an intense, yet not uncomfortable "tight" sensation on my right temple. Dan is looking very lethargic. I'm riding the ridge between uneasy and buzzing. Two neuroscientists are also in the room. Dan and I are holding phones, with an app. His subdued state, and my alertness aren't a result of too much/too little coffee. We're self-administering these sensations through the app. This is Thync, a wearable device that uses neurosignaling to shift your mood. It's working.
Scientists can make your inner monologue audible
When you hear someone else speak, specific neurons in your brain fire. Brian Pasley and a bunch of his colleagues discovered this at the University of California, Berkeley. And not only that, but those neurons all appeared to be tuned to specific sound frequencies. So, Pasley had a thought: "If you're reading text in a newspaper or a book, you hear a voice in your own head," so why can't we decode that internal voice simply by monitoring brain activity. It's similar to the idea that led to the creation of BrainPort, which lets you "see" with your tongue. Your eyes, ears or vocal chords don't really do the heavy lifting, it's your brain. And if you can give the brain another source of input or output you might be able to train it to approximate a lost ability like speech.
Atom-scale brain sensors will show exactly how your mind works
Neural activity maps frequently present an incomplete picture of how a brain works; you can measure electrical activity, stimulate it or visualize the anatomy, but you can't do all three. DARPA and the University of Wisconsin might just pull off that seemingly impossible feat, however. They recently built a hybrid brain sensor that combines both electrical and optical techniques to present a vivid picture of what's happening inside the mind. The sensor is primarily made of ultra-thin graphene (just four atoms thick) that both conducts electricity and lets light through. By putting this device on top of neural tissue, you can simultaneously create brain activity and monitor virtually every aspect of it. Graphene is safe for your body, too, so you shouldn't face the same risks you see with metal alloys.
Multitasking may be affecting the density of your grey-matter
Reading this article on a laptop while watching TV and idly scrolling through tweets on your phone? You're a multitasker, and it may be changing the structure of your brain. New research from the University of Sussex suggests that people who simultaneously use multiple media devices on a regular basis seem to have less grey-matter density in a particular region of the brain than folks who use just one device at a time. That isn't to say that media consumption is rotting your brain, however -- researchers say it's more of a link than a cause: it's not clear if multitasking causes less-dense grey matter or if people with certain brain structures are simply more prone to multitasking.
In movies, CGI is best when you don't even notice it
Cinema screens are huge, which is odd, because the eye can only focus on a small portion of what's in front of it at any one time. That's what prompted the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to team up with neuroscientists from Birkbeck, University of London, who in turn recruited eye-tracking firm Tobii. The trio embarked upon a project to determine where people concentrated their gaze. Then, by using Tobii's hardware, were able to create a heat map that was overlaid on the frame, much in the same way that SMI analyzes sports matche. The conclusions from the research found that the best use of CGI isn't to make big robots at the front of the frame, but to fill in all of the spare detail that you're not looking at.
Recommended Reading: 'Guardians of the Galaxy' makeup magic
Recommended Reading highlights the best long-form writing on technology and more in print and on the web. Some weeks, you'll also find short reviews of books that we think are worth your time. We hope you enjoy the read. Under the Skin of "Guardians of the Galaxy" with Makeup FX Wizard David White by Scott Pierce, Fast Company If you're into getting a peek behind the scenes at some movie magic, Fast Company caught up with FX artist David White to discuss Guardians of the Galaxy. Specifically covering the makeup special effects, White chats about Marvel, key characters and the process of making aliens.
