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Scientists Use Quake 2 To Study the Brains of Mice
An anonymous reader writes "In this week's issue of Nature, scientists from Princeton University trained mice to navigate around a virtual environment using a setup that resembles a combination of a giant trackball and a mini-iMax theater displaying a virtual world rendered using a modified version of the Quake 2 open source game engine. (Here's the academic paper, subscription required.) They hold the mouse's head still atop a giant trackball, which the mouse turns by running. The scientists use the rotations to move the mouse around in the virtual environment, and when he reaches certain places, he gets a reward. Because they are able to hold the head still, they can stick microscopic glass electrodes into individual neurons in the hippocampus of this mouse as it 'navigates.' They find the neural activity that resembles activity during real life navigation, and learned new things about the inputs and computations that are going on inside these neurons, which weren't known before. No word as of yet whether the scientists plan on giving the mice control of the gun. Wonder whether John Carmack ever envisioned this when he opened up the Quake code?"
Yo dawg, I heard you liked mice, so I put a mouse on your mouse.
God spoke to me.
If only we could do this with gamers who need exercise. They get a better immersive experience AND get fit at the same time.
OK, so the open-brain surgery thing is going to be controversial, but...
"This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
If I ever get fragged by a mouse, I hope no one ever tells me.
I'd be interested to see what would happen if they provided some kind of negative feedback to the mouse when a player shot it, and then just let them run rampant in there. I'd imagine mice would have a far better reaction rate then people in it.
So basically, -1 troll/offtopic is really slashdots way of saying "I hate that you thought of something before me."
I invision an army of mice farming gold in World of Warcraft, we could do it even cheaper than the Chinese!
Catching mice that get in my house is enough of a pain, but now I have to snag the bastards while they're rocket jumping? Thanks, jerks.
This is a great example of open source really helping humanity learn new and interesting things.
It's great to see that the tools provided by open software can really help speed up research.
I wonder what would happen if old versions of adobe photoshop, 3ds max, or cubase were left to open source for research purposes. What kind of discoveries would scientists make with programs like these?
Someone is likely to say it, so I will:
This is what happens when you have a free flow of information. Carmack got well paid for Quake 2 then opened the source up (eventually). If more people/institutions/corps did this it seems there would not only be more hearts and flowers (for all the open source hippies) but there would be MORE technology we could patent! The ability to make MORE money!
If I have 2 innovative products and I decide to open them up to general use, and at least 1 new idea comes from that, someone out there will create something with it and hopefully create a net gain for the system as a whole in the long run.
I know people are selfish, but for Science's sake, open up your information already! The economy is dying a slow, painful death (though the market might refute that this week), wouldn't the SOLUTION in The States be to repeal some copyright laws and let information flow freely so as to foster innovation like this? Even if it's a mouse on a ball in a hall at the mall, I have to believe only good could come from opening things up a bit more.
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I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Beats a console controller any day, even lab scientists agree
They initially tried this study using managers, but there was no evidence that the managers were learning anthing or that they even perceived their environment
They need to hook it up to the device that gave mice orgasms at the push of a button, so that one frag is one orgasm. And then let them loose in quakelive.
"Are you pondering what I am pondering, Pinky?"
"I think so Brain, but how can I bunny-hop over the lava when I'm a mouse?"
www.eFax.com are spammers
Hmm, yeah, and they should train the mouse to fire the gun by rewarding it – first, make it find a target and operate the "gun firing" switch (whatever that is). Then train it to find a person and target them and "fire". Finally, put it up against armed opponents, give negative feedback if the mouse gets shot, and see what happens. Will the mouse go for positive feedback (by shooting opponents), will it hide/flee from the opponents (to escape the negative feedback it learns to associate with being shot by them), or will it be intelligent enough to create a new self-defense mechanism whereby it learns that by shooting the opponents before they can shoot it, it can both avoid the negative feedback and at the same time get positive feedback?
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
The researchers originally wanted to use Half-Life instead of Quake 2, but they could never get the mice to do anything in the game other than murdering the scientists.
"FDA staff reviewers expressed concern about the number of patients who were left out of the study because they died."
Just thought I'd point out that
despite all my rage, I am still just a rat in a cage.
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
I wondered why the last arena I logged in to had the quad damage replaced by a wheel of cheese, and why the rocket pickups were shaped like little smudges of peanut butter.
There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
I suspect learning to use the in-game offense/defense mechanisms would tax the mouse's brain far beyond its capacity already without adding the complexity of choosing between different weapons.
Although that does make me think of another interesting thing. Mice are more of a foraging creature... they look for food and hide from predators, fighting back only when cornered. A FPS, on the other hand, lends itself to predatory tactics... seeking your prey and killing them without being killed by their defensive tactics. Is it even possible for a mouse to learn to exhibit predatory behavior using a reward system, if their prey tendencies to flee or hide are being simultaneously triggered as their target fights back? If a bunch of mice were put into such a simulation, would they all hide from each other? Would they actively seek and kill each other? Or would there be some of both, where some mice tended to behave in a predatory manner (aggressive personalities?) while others hid (passive/survival)?
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
Um... Squeak?
The enemies of Democracy are
There's no way this would fly with animal rights. So it'd probably have to be done in China... prompting the question, which rodent is most efficient at gold farming? My bet would be on squirrels.
Care to volunteer for open brain surgery instead?