First artificial neural network created out of DNA: Molecular soup exhibits brainlike behavior

First artificial neural network created out of DNA: Molecular soup exhibits brainlike behavior: "Researchers have now taken a major step toward creating artificial intelligence -- not in a robot or a silicon chip, but in a test tube. The researchers are the first to have made an artificial neural network out of DNA, creating a circuit of interacting molecules that can recall memories based on incomplete patterns, just as a brain can."

Can humans sense Earth's magnetism? Human retina protein can function as light-sensitive magnetic sensor

Can humans sense Earth's magnetism? Human retina protein can function as light-sensitive magnetic sensor: "New research shows that a protein expressed in the human retina can sense magnetic fields when implanted into Drosophila, reopening an area of sensory biology in humans for further exploration."

Brain-like computing a step closer to reality

Brain-like computing a step closer to reality: "The development of 'brain-like' computers has taken a major step forward. A new study involved the first ever demonstration of simultaneous information processing and storage using phase-change materials. This new technique could revolutionize computing by making computers faster and more energy-efficient, as well as making them more closely resemble biological systems."

Brain performs near optimal visual search

Brain performs near optimal visual search: "Visual search is an important task for the brain. Surprisingly, even in a complex task like detecting an object in a scene with distractions, we find that people's performance is near optimal. That means that the brain manages to do the best possible job given the available information, according to researchers."

Aneyoshi Journal: Tsunami Warnings, Written in Stone

Aneyoshi Journal: Tsunami Warnings, Written in Stone: "Stone tablets in coastal Japan, some more than six centuries old, are inscribed with simple messages about tsunamis, or give the toll from past disasters."

Spatial navigation training protects the hippocampus against age-related changes during early and late adulthood

Spatial navigation training protects the hippocampus against age-related changes during early and late adulthood: "Publication year: 2011
Source: Neurobiology of Aging, In Press, Corrected Proof, Available online 16 April 2011
Martin, Lövdén , Sabine, Schaefer , Hannes, Noack , Nils Christian, Bodammer , Simone, Kühn , ...
It is unknown whether lifestyle, including mental stimulation, and appropriate training interventions, may directly improve spatial navigation performance and its underlying neural substrates. Here we report that healthy younger and older men performing a cognitively demanding spatial navigation task every other day over 4 months display navigation-related gains in performance and stable hippocampal volumes that were maintained 4 months after termination of training. In contrast, control groups displayed volume decrements consistent with longitudinal estimates of age-related decline. Hippocampal barrier density, as indicated by mean diffusivity estimated from diffusion tensor imaging, showed a quadratic shape of increased density after training followed..."

Reversible large-scale modification of cortical networks during neuroprosthetic control

Reversible large-scale modification of cortical networks during neuroprosthetic control: "

Reversible large-scale modification of cortical networks during neuroprosthetic control

Nature Neuroscience.
doi:10.1038/nn.2797

Authors: Karunesh Ganguly, Dragan F Dimitrov, Jonathan D Wallis & Jose M Carmena

"

Better a sprint than a marathon: Brief intense exercise better than endurance training for preventing cardiovascular disease

Better a sprint than a marathon: Brief intense exercise better than endurance training for preventing cardiovascular disease: "Exercise is important for preventing cardiovascular disease, especially in children and adolescents, but is all exercise equally beneficial? New research reveals that high intensity exercise is more beneficial than traditional endurance training."

A synaptic organizing principle for cortical neuronal groups [Neuroscience]

A synaptic organizing principle for cortical neuronal groups [Neuroscience]: "Neuronal circuitry is often considered a clean slate that can be dynamically and arbitrarily molded by experience. However, when we investigated synaptic connectivity in groups of pyramidal neurons in the neocortex, we found that both connectivity and synaptic weights were surprisingly predictable. Synaptic weights follow very closely the number of connections in a group of neurons, saturating after only 20% of possible connections are formed between neurons in a group. When we examined the network topology of connectivity between neurons, we found that the neurons cluster into small world networks that are not scale-free, with less than 2 degrees of separation. We found a simple clustering rule where connectivity is directly proportional to the number of common neighbors, which accounts for these small world networks and accurately predicts the connection probability between any two neurons. This pyramidal neuron network clusters into multiple groups of a few dozen neurons each. The neurons composing each group are surprisingly distributed, typically more than 100 μm apart, allowing for multiple groups to be interlaced in the same space. In summary, we discovered a synaptic organizing principle that groups neurons in a manner that is common across animals and hence, independent of individual experiences. We speculate that these elementary neuronal groups are prescribed Lego-like building blocks of perception and that acquired memory relies more on combining these elementary assemblies into higher-order constructs."

[Review] How to Grow a Mind: Statistics, Structure, and Abstraction

[Review] How to Grow a Mind: Statistics, Structure, and Abstraction: "

Authors: Joshua B. Tenenbaum, Charles Kemp, Thomas L. Griffiths, Noah D. Goodman"

200-300 bodies found in Japan's tsunami-hit Sendai

200-300 bodies found in Japan's tsunami-hit Sendai: "TOKYO: Around 200 to 300 bodies were found in a part of Japan's quake and tsunami hit Pacific coast town of Sendai, police said Friday according to media reports."

Alcoholic Beverages Induce Superconductivity

Alcoholic Beverages Induce Superconductivity: "

Wine can help keep conversation flowing at a dinner party. And now it looks like that wine may aid in materials science as well. Japanese researchers discovered that hot alcoholic beverages induce superconductivity in iron-based compounds.

 

[More]"

Why information can't be the basis of reality

Why information can't be the basis of reality: "

Is everything information? This seductive idea animates the brand-new book The Information by James Gleick (Pantheon 2011), which I just rave-reviewed in The Wall Street Journal . Gleick's book is, among other things, an in-depth biography of information theory, which the Bell Labs mathematician Claude Shannon invented in 1948 to provide a framework for improving the efficiency of communications.

A growing number of scientists, Gleick writes, are beginning to wonder whether information "may be primary: more fundamental than matter itself." This notion has inspired other recent books, including Programming the Universe by Seth Lloyd (Vintage 2007), Decoding the Universe by Charles Seife (Penguin 2007), Decoding Reality by Vlatko Vedral (Oxford 2010) and Information and the Nature of Reality , a collection of essays edited by Paul Davies (Cambridge 2010). But the everything-is-information meme violates common sense.

[More]"

Effects of Cell Phone Radiofrequency Signal Exposure on Brain Glucose Metabolism [Preliminary Communication]

Effects of Cell Phone Radiofrequency Signal Exposure on Brain Glucose Metabolism [Preliminary Communication]: "

Context The dramatic increase in use of cellular telephones has generated concern about possible negative effects of radiofrequency signals delivered to the brain. However, whether acute cell phone exposure affects the human brain is unclear.

Objective To evaluate if acute cell phone exposure affects brain glucose metabolism, a marker of brain activity.

Design, Setting, and Participants Randomized crossover study conducted between January 1 and December 31, 2009, at a single US laboratory among 47 healthy participants recruited from the community. Cell phones were placed on the left and right ears and positron emission tomography with (¹⁸F)fluorodeoxyglucose injection was used to measure brain glucose metabolism twice, once with the right cell phone activated (sound muted) for 50 minutes ('on' condition) and once with both cell phones deactivated ('off' condition). Statistical parametric mapping was used to compare metabolism between on and off conditions using paired t tests, and Pearson linear correlations were used to verify the association of metabolism and estimated amplitude of radiofrequency-modulated electromagnetic waves emitted by the cell phone. Clusters with at least 1000 voxels (volume >8 cm³) and P < .05 (corrected for multiple comparisons) were considered significant.

Main Outcome Measure Brain glucose metabolism computed as absolute metabolism (µmol/100 g per minute) and as normalized metabolism (region/whole brain).

Results Whole-brain metabolism did not differ between on and off conditions. In contrast, metabolism in the region closest to the antenna (orbitofrontal cortex and temporal pole) was significantly higher for on than off conditions (35.7 vs 33.3 µmol/100 g per minute; mean difference, 2.4 [95% confidence interval, 0.67-4.2]; P = .004). The increases were significantly correlated with the estimated electromagnetic field amplitudes both for absolute metabolism (R = 0.95, P < .001) and normalized metabolism (R = 0.89; P < .001).

Conclusions In healthy participants and compared with no exposure, 50-minute cell phone exposure was associated with increased brain glucose metabolism in the region closest to the antenna. This finding is of unknown clinical significance.

"

Robot Butler Hitching Ride to Space on Shuttle Discovery - Fox News

Robot Butler Hitching Ride to Space on Shuttle Discovery - Fox News: "

CBC.ca

Robot Butler Hitching Ride to Space on Shuttle Discovery Fox News Life aboard the International Space Station will get a little cushier when a robot butler arrives at the orbiting lab later this week. The space shuttle Discovery, slated to launch Thursday afternoon, is carrying a humanoid robot named ... Space shuttle Discovery fueled for its last flightReuters Final countdown: Space shuttle Discover blasts off for the last time todayDigitaltrends.com Space shuttle Discovery poised for final liftoffUSA Today Space.com -The Daily Citizen all 1,919 news articles »

"

National Margarita Day: Recipes to Celebrate With! - myGLOSS

National Margarita Day: Recipes to Celebrate With! - myGLOSS: "

HULIQ

National Margarita Day: Recipes to Celebrate With! myGLOSS It's National Margarita Day! Who knew? But now that you do know, we've got some recipes to help you celebrate the holiday with classic recipes and some tasty variations too. First, a good margarita has to have good chips and salsa to go with…so pick up ... It's National Margarita DayMyFox Chicago Today is National Margarita DayCorpus Christi Caller Times It's National Margarita Day - do you have a favorite NJ Mexican restaurant?NJ.com Huffington Post -Long Island Press -San Antonio Express all 42 news articles »

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Scientists steer car with the power of thought

Scientists steer car with the power of thought: "Computer scientists have developed a system making it possible to steer a car with your thoughts. Using new commercially available sensors to measure brain waves -- sensors for recording electroencephalograms (EEG) -- the scientists were able to distinguish the bioelectrical wave patterns for control commands such as 'left,' 'right,' 'accelerate' or 'brake' in a test subject."

Scientists customize a magnet's performance by strategically replacing key atoms

Scientists customize a magnet's performance by strategically replacing key atoms: "Scientists have strategically replaced key atoms in a gadolinium-germanium compound, causing changes in the resulting alloy's ferromagnetism. The discovery may eventually help as materials scientists search for new, exotic substances for use in today's and future generations of high-tech products."

Researchers aim to resurrect mammoth in five years

Researchers aim to resurrect mammoth in five years: "TOKYO - Japanese researchers will launch a project this year to resurrect the long-extinct mammoth by using cloning technology to bring the ancient pachyderm back to life in around five years' time."

Learning to move machines with the mind

Learning to move machines with the mind: "Publication year: 2010
Source: Trends in Neurosciences, In Press, Corrected Proof, Available online 20 December 2010
Andrea M., Green , John F., Kalaska
Brain–computer interfaces (BCIs) extract signals from neural activity to control remote devices ranging from computer cursors to limb-like robots. They show great potential to help patients with severe motor deficits perform everyday tasks without the constant assistance of caregivers. Understanding the neural mechanisms by which subjects use BCI systems could lead to improved designs and provide unique insights into normal motor control and skill acquisition. However, reports vary considerably about how much training is required to use a BCI system, the degree to which performance improves with practice and the underlying neural mechanisms. This review examines these diverse findings, their..."