Moderators: Elvis, DrVolin, Jeff
by justdrew » Fri Nov 15, 2013 7:41 am
by slimmouse » Sat Nov 16, 2013 5:39 am
by justdrew » Sat Nov 16, 2013 2:55 pm
slimmouse » 16 Nov 2013 02:39 wrote:Thorium-Fueled Automobile Engine Needs Refueling Once a Century
http://www.industrytap.com/thorium-fuel ... tury/15649
by justdrew » Sun Nov 17, 2013 8:09 pm
Your brain sees things you don't
University of Arizona doctoral degree candidate Jay Sanguinetti has authored a new study, published online in the journal Psychological Science, that indicates that the brain processes and understands visusal input that we may never consciously perceive. The finding challenges currently accepted models about how the brain processes visual information.
A doctoral candidate in the UA's Department of Psychology in the College of Science, Sanguinetti showed study participants a series of black silhouettes, some of which contained meaningful, real-world objects hidden in the white spaces on the outsides. Saguinetti worked with his adviser Mary Peterson, a professor of psychology and director of the UA's Cognitive Science Program, and with John Allen, a UA Distinguished Professor of psychology, cognitive science and neuroscience, to monitor subjects' brainwaves with an electroencephalogram, or EEG, while they viewed the objects.
"We were asking the question of whether the brain was processing the meaning of the objects that are on the outside of these silhouettes," Sanguinetti said. "The specific question was, 'Does the brain process those hidden shapes to the level of meaning, even when the subject doesn't consciously see them?"
The answer, Sanguinetti's data indicates, is yes.
Study participants' brainwaves indicated that even if a person never consciously recognized the shapes on the outside of the image, their brains still processed those shapes to the level of understanding their meaning.
"There's a brain signature for meaningful processing," Sanguinetti said. A peak in the averaged brainwaves called N400 indicates that the brain has recognized an object and associated it with a particular meaning.
"It happens about 400 milliseconds after the image is shown, less than a half a second," said Peterson. "As one looks at brainwaves, they're undulating above a baseline axis and below that axis. The negative ones below the axis are called N and positive ones above the axis are called P, so N400 means it's a negative waveform that happens approximately 400 milliseconds after the image is shown."
The presence of the N400 peak indicates that subjects' brains recognize the meaning of the shapes on the outside of the figure.
"The participants in our experiments don't see those shapes on the outside; nonetheless, the brain signature tells us that they have processed the meaning of those shapes," said Peterson. "But the brain rejects them as interpretations, and if it rejects the shapes from conscious perception, then you won't have any awareness of them."
(more at link)
by justdrew » Tue Nov 19, 2013 5:35 am
Fountain-of-youth gene unleashes healing power
A protein naturally expressed in embryos boosts repair capacity in adult tissues.
by Monya Baker | 07 November 2013
Mice that had been genetically engineered to develop tumours failed to do so. Instead, the animals grew up to be huge and very hairy. And when the tips of the pups’ toes were clipped off in a routine tagging procedure, they often grew back.
What was different about these mice was that they carried a protein, Lin28a, which is generally produced only in developing embryos. Lin28a has already garnered attention for its involvement in the functioning of stem cells and in cancer. A study published today in Cell now shows that this protein can improve tissue repair — even in adults. In mice genetically modified to produce the protein throughout their lives, the animals’ hair grew faster than normal and puncture wounds in their ears healed almost completely.
“We were just so shocked that such a small change in this gene could have profound effects on a complex regenerating tissue,” says Hao Zhu, a cell biologist at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas and an author on the study.
Resetting cells using embryonic genes has been seen before, most prominently in the creation of cells known as induced pluripotent stem cells, which acquire an embryonic-like state after a suite of genes is activated. But the latest study reveals that such de-ageing changes can be made not just in cultured cells, but in developed tissues within an organism. It suggests that it might be possible to make older tissues behave more like young ones, which are much better at repairing damage. In mammalian fetuses, for example, even deep wounds can heal without scarring.
( - more at link - )
by justdrew » Sun Nov 24, 2013 10:36 pm
justdrew » 13 Aug 2013 01:23 wrote:This one's a jaw--dropper...
Seems to me this would be the biggest thing since penicillin? Maybe actually FAR BIGGER.
headline worthy story here... If it works on pluripotent stem cells, I would be it can be adapted to work with zygotes or gametes etcNew gene repair technique promises advances in regenerative medicine
Using human pluripotent stem cells and DNA-cutting protein from meningitis bacteria, researchers from the Morgridge Institute for Research and Northwestern University have created an efficient way to target and repair defective genes.
Writing today (Monday, Aug. 12, 2013) in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the team reports that the novel technique is much simpler than previous methods and establishes the groundwork for major advances in regenerative medicine, drug screening and biomedical research.
Zhonggang Hou of the Morgridge Institute's regenerative biology team and Yan Zhang of Northwestern University served as first authors on the study; Dr. James Thomson, director of regenerative biology at the Morgridge Institute, and Erik Sontheimer, professor of molecular biosciences at Northwestern University, served as principal investigators.
"With this system, there is the potential to repair any genetic defect, including those responsible for some forms of breast cancer, Parkinson's and other diseases," Hou said. "The fact that it can be applied to human pluripotent stem cells opens the door for meaningful therapeutic applications."
Zhang said the Northwestern University team focused on Neisseria meningitidis bacteria because it is a good source of the Cas9 protein needed for precisely cleaving damaged sections of DNA.
"We are able to guide this protein with different types of small RNA molecules, allowing us to carefully remove, replace or correct problem genes," Zhang said. "This represents a step forward from other recent technologies built upon proteins such as zinc finger nucleases and TALENs."
These previous gene correction methods required engineered proteins to help with the cutting. Hou said scientists can synthesize RNA for the new process in as little as one to three days – compared with the weeks or months needed to engineer suitable proteins.
Thomson, who also serves as the James Kress Professor of Embryonic Stem Cell Biology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, a John D. MacArthur professor at UW–Madison's School of Medicine and Public Health and a professor in the department of molecular, cellular and developmental biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, says the discovery holds many practical applications.
"Human pluripotent stem cells can proliferate indefinitely and they give rise to virtually all human cell types, making them invaluable for regenerative medicine, drug screening and biomedical research," Thomson says. "Our collaboration with the Northwestern team has taken us further toward realizing the full potential of these cells because we can now manipulate their genomes in a precise, efficient manner."
Sontheimer, who serves as the Soretta and Henry Shapiro Research Professor of Molecular Biology with Northwestern's department of molecular biosciences, Center for Genetic Medicine and the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University, says the team's results also offer hopeful signs about the safety of the technique.
"A major concern with previous methods involved inadvertent or off-target cleaving, raising issues about the potential impact in regenerative medicine applications," he said. "Beyond overcoming the safety obstacles, the system's ease of use will make what was once considered a difficult project into a routine laboratory technique, catalyzing future research."
"Joseph Stromberg writes at the Smithsonian that one afternoon in October 2005, neuroscientist James Fallon was sifting through thousands of PET scans to find anatomical patterns in the brain that correlated with psychopathic tendencies in the real world. 'Out of serendipity, I was also doing a study on Alzheimer's and as part of that, had brain scans from me and everyone in my family right on my desk,' writes Fallon. 'I got to the bottom of the stack, and saw this scan that was obviously pathological.' When he looked up the code, he was greeted by an unsettling revelation: the psychopathic brain pictured in the scan was his own. When he underwent a series of genetic tests, he got more bad news. 'I had all these high-risk alleles for aggression, violence and low empathy,' he says, such as a variant of the MAO-A gene that has been linked with aggressive behavior. It wasn't entirely a shock to Fallon, as he'd always been aware that he was someone especially motivated by power and manipulating others. Additionally, his family line included seven alleged murderers, including Lizzie Borden, infamously accused of killing her father and stepmother in 1892. Many of us would hide this discovery and never tell a soul, out of fear or embarrassment of being labeled a psychopath. Perhaps because boldness and disinhibition are noted psychopathic tendencies, Fallon has gone in the opposite direction, telling the world about his finding in a TED Talk, an NPR interview and now a new book published last month, The Psychopath Inside. 'Since finding all this out and looking into it, I've made an effort to try to change my behavior,' says Fallon. 'I've more consciously been doing things that are considered "the right thing to do," and thinking more about other people's feelings.'"
by Freitag » Wed Nov 27, 2013 11:17 am
Germ-killing nanosurface opens up new front in hygiene
Imagine a hospital room, door handle or kitchen countertop that is free from bacteria -- and not one drop of disinfectant or boiling water or dose of microwaves has been needed to zap the germs.
That is the idea behind a startling discovery made by scientists in Australia.
In a study published on Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications, they described how a dragonfly led them to a nano-tech surface that physically slays bacteria.
The germ-killer is black silicon, a substance discovered accidentally in the 1990s and now viewed as a promising semiconductor material for solar panels.
Under an electron microscope, its surface is a forest of spikes just 500 nanometres (500 billionths of a metre) high that rip open the cell walls of any bacterium which comes into contact, the scientists found.
It is the first time that any water-repellent surface has been found to have this physical quality as bactericide.
Last year, the team, led by Elena Ivanova at Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, were stunned to find cicada wings were potent killers of Pseudomonas aeruginsoa -- an opportunist germ that also infects humans and is becoming resistant to antibiotics.
Looking closely, they found that the answer lay not in any biochemical on the wing, but in regularly-spaced "nanopillars" on which bacteria were sliced to shreds as they settled on the surface.
They took the discovery further by examining nanostructures studding the translucent forewings of a red-bodied Australian dragonfly called the wandering percher (Latin name Diplacodes bipunctata).
It has spikes that are somewhat smaller than those on the black silicon -- they are 240 nanometres high.
The dragonfly's wings and black silicon were put through their paces in a lab, and both were ruthlessly bactericidal.
Smooth to the human touch, the surfaces destroyed two categories of bacteria, called Gram-negative and Gram-positive, as well as spores, the protective shell that coats certain times of dormant germs.
The three targeted bugs comprised P. aeruginosa, the notorious Staphylococcus aureus and the ultra-tough spore of Bacillus subtilis, a wide-ranging soil germ that is a cousin of anthrax.
The killing rate was 450,000 bacterial cells per square centimetre per minute over the first three hours of exposure.
This is 810 times the minimum dose needed to infect a person with S. aureus, and a whopping 77,400 times that of P. aeruginosa.
If the cost of making black silicon is an obstacle, many other options are around for making nano-scale germ-killing surfaces, said the scientists.
"Synthetic antibacterial nano-materials that exhibit a similar effectiveness... can be readily fabricated over large areas," they wrote.
by justdrew » Wed Nov 27, 2013 7:44 pm
by Freitag » Thu Nov 28, 2013 2:21 am
justdrew wrote:hey, that's gotta be cheaper than copper (another substance with good antibacterial properties).
by justdrew » Thu Nov 28, 2013 2:53 am
Freitag » 27 Nov 2013 23:21 wrote:justdrew wrote:hey, that's gotta be cheaper than copper (another substance with good antibacterial properties).
Yeah and it works in a different way, so that's good.
by justdrew » Sun Dec 01, 2013 9:20 pm
"My early results suggested I had discovered something that was in the math all along," he recalled. "I suddenly realized that if you made the thickness of the negative vacuum energy ring larger — like shifting from a belt shape to a donut shape — and oscillate the warp bubble, you can greatly reduce the energy required — perhaps making the idea plausible." White had adjusted the shape of Alcubierre's ring which surrounded the spheroid from something that was a flat halo to something that was thicker and curvier.
He presented the results of his Alcubierre Drive rethink a year later at the 100 Year Starship conference in Atlanta where he highlighted his new optimization approaches — a new design that could significantly reduce the amount of exotic matter required. And in fact, White says that the warp drive could be powered by a mass that's even less than that of the Voyager 1 spacecraft.
That's a significant change in calculations to say the least. The reduction in mass from a Jupiter-sized planet to an object that weighs a mere 1,600 pounds has completely reset White's sense of plausibility — and NASA's.
by justdrew » Tue Jan 07, 2014 6:27 am
Epilepsy drug turns out to help adults acquire perfect pitch and learn language like kids
By Scott Kaufman | Monday, January 6, 2014 9:50 EST
A team of researchers from across the globe believe they have discovered a means of re-opening “critical periods” in brain development, allowing adults to acquire abilities — such as perfect pitch or fluency in language — that could previously only be acquired early in life.
According to the study in Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience, the mood-stabilizing drug valproate allows the adult brain to absorb new information as effortlessly as it did during critical windows in childhood.
A critical period is “a fixed window of time, usually early in an organism’s lifespan, during which experience has lasting effects on the development of brain function and behavior.” They are, for example, what allows children to enter into language without any formal training in grammar or vocabulary.
The researchers postulated that because such periods close when enzymes “impose ‘brakes’ on neuroplasticity,” a drug that blocks the productions of those enzymes might be able to “reopen critical-period neuroplasticity.”
Takao Hensch, a molecular biologist at Harvard, told NPR about the experiment in which the enzyme-inhibitor valproate was administered to adult males with no musical training as they attempted to acquire absolute or “perfect” pitch. They used absolute pitch as a means of measuring plasticity because “there are no known cases of an adult successfully acquiring it.”
The men — half of whom took valproate, the other half a placebo — performed online tasks to train their ears to recognize tone.
“Given the difficulty of improving [absolute pitch] performance in adulthood,” the researchers wrote, “we hypothesize that in our task, even a small advantage in pitch class identification in [the valproate group] as compared to the placebo group is suggestive of the reopening of plasticity, as musically naïve participants were trained for a relatively short time period on several pitch classes, conditions under which no existing study has shown any improvement in [absolute pitch].”
The results were that those who took the valproate scored much higher on pitch tests than those who underwent similar training but only took the placebo.
“Our study,” the authors conclude, “is the first to show a change in [absolute pitch recognition] with any kind of drug treatment. The finding that [valproate] can restore plasticity in a fundamental perceptual system in adulthood provides compelling evidence that one of the modes of action for [valproate] in psychiatric treatment may be to facilitate reorganization and rewiring of otherwise firmly established pathways in the brain.”
by justdrew » Tue Jan 21, 2014 5:28 am
Discovery of Quantum Vibrations in 'Microtubules' Inside Brain Neurons Supports Controversial Theory of Consciousness
Jan. 16, 2014 — A review and update of a controversial 20-year-old theory of consciousness published in Physics of Life Reviews claims that consciousness derives from deeper level, finer scale activities inside brain neurons. The recent discovery of quantum vibrations in "microtubules" inside brain neurons corroborates this theory, according to review authors Stuart Hameroff and Sir Roger Penrose. They suggest that EEG rhythms (brain waves) also derive from deeper level microtubule vibrations, and that from a practical standpoint, treating brain microtubule vibrations could benefit a host of mental, neurological, and cognitive conditions.
The theory, called "orchestrated objective reduction" ('Orch OR'), was first put forward in the mid-1990s by eminent mathematical physicist Sir Roger Penrose, FRS, Mathematical Institute and Wadham College, University of Oxford, and prominent anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff, MD, Anesthesiology, Psychology and Center for Consciousness Studies, The University of Arizona, Tucson. They suggested that quantum vibrational computations in microtubules were "orchestrated" ("Orch") by synaptic inputs and memory stored in microtubules, and terminated by Penrose "objective reduction" ('OR'), hence "Orch OR." Microtubules are major components of the cell structural skeleton.
Orch OR was harshly criticized from its inception, as the brain was considered too "warm, wet, and noisy" for seemingly delicate quantum processes.. However, evidence has now shown warm quantum coherence in plant photosynthesis, bird brain navigation, our sense of smell, and brain microtubules. The recent discovery of warm temperature quantum vibrations in microtubules inside brain neurons by the research group led by Anirban Bandyopadhyay, PhD, at the National Institute of Material Sciences in Tsukuba, Japan (and now at MIT), corroborates the pair's theory and suggests that EEG rhythms also derive from deeper level microtubule vibrations. In addition, work from the laboratory of Roderick G. Eckenhoff, MD, at the University of Pennsylvania, suggests that anesthesia, which selectively erases consciousness while sparing non-conscious brain activities, acts via microtubules in brain neurons.
"The origin of consciousness reflects our place in the universe, the nature of our existence. Did consciousness evolve from complex computations among brain neurons, as most scientists assert? Or has consciousness, in some sense, been here all along, as spiritual approaches maintain?" ask Hameroff and Penrose in the current review. "This opens a potential Pandora's Box, but our theory accommodates both these views, suggesting consciousness derives from quantum vibrations in microtubules, protein polymers inside brain neurons, which both govern neuronal and synaptic function, and connect brain processes to self-organizing processes in the fine scale, 'proto-conscious' quantum structure of reality."
After 20 years of skeptical criticism, "the evidence now clearly supports Orch OR," continue Hameroff and Penrose. "Our new paper updates the evidence, clarifies Orch OR quantum bits, or "qubits," as helical pathways in microtubule lattices, rebuts critics, and reviews 20 testable predictions of Orch OR published in 1998 -- of these, six are confirmed and none refuted."
An important new facet of the theory is introduced. Microtubule quantum vibrations (e.g. in megahertz) appear to interfere and produce much slower EEG "beat frequencies." Despite a century of clinical use, the underlying origins of EEG rhythms have remained a mystery. Clinical trials of brief brain stimulation aimed at microtubule resonances with megahertz mechanical vibrations using transcranial ultrasound have shown reported improvements in mood, and may prove useful against Alzheimer's disease and brain injury in the future.
Lead author Stuart Hameroff concludes, "Orch OR is the most rigorous, comprehensive and successfully-tested theory of consciousness ever put forth. From a practical standpoint, treating brain microtubule vibrations could benefit a host of mental, neurological, and cognitive conditions."
The review is accompanied by eight commentaries from outside authorities, including an Australian group of Orch OR arch-skeptics. To all, Hameroff and Penrose respond robustly.
Penrose, Hameroff and Bandyopadhyay will explore their theories during a session on "Microtubules and the Big Consciousness Debate" at the Brainstorm Sessions, a public three-day event at the Brakke Grond in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, January 16-18, 2014. They will engage skeptics in a debate on the nature of consciousness, and Bandyopadhyay and his team will couple microtubule vibrations from active neurons to play Indian musical instruments. "Consciousness depends on anharmonic vibrations of microtubules inside neurons, similar to certain kinds of Indian music, but unlike Western music which is harmonic," Hameroff explains.
by coffin_dodger » Tue Jan 21, 2014 5:47 am
justdrew wrote:...Clinical trials of brief brain stimulation aimed at microtubule resonances with megahertz mechanical vibrations using transcranial ultrasound have shown reported improvements in mood....
by slimmouse » Tue Jan 21, 2014 12:39 pm
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 24 guests