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Researchers Create Short-term Memories In Rat Brains
An anonymous reader writes "Researchers say they've found a way to store artificial short-term memories in isolated brain tissue. 'This is the first time anyone has found a way to store information over seconds about both temporal sequences and stimulus patterns directly in brain tissue,' says the study's lead. 'This paves the way for future research to identify the specific brain circuits that allow us to form short-term memories.' The peer-reviewed study can be found here (paywalled)."
Total Ratcall was it?
I might be an anomaly, but after highschool and college, I developed the ability to push things directly to long-term memory, and shortchange the short-term, removing the volatility.
I know I can do that, because the information and even the circumstances happening around me are stored such that I can recall them clearly now, years later. (The first time I did it was durng a cram session in science class concerning the simple machines physics test material in HS. I remember the entire circumstance clearly. Upon learning I could do this, I never had to really study again, just make the concious effort to store the information permanently. The most recent time I used it was last week over the holiday weekend. I visited a friend and took some extra days off. His parents wanted him to find some unusual ingredients for a recipe his dad had found online, and I memorized the missing items: mediteranean couscous, lemon preserves, and picholine olives.)
Let me know when they can deal with long term memories, because there is some stagnant data in my head that needs purging. I don't need to remember the conversation I had with the engineering student on the SW airlines return flight from my california vacation two years ago. That and numberous other things could safely be removed.
There really is no justification for this type of research. I can't think of any possible good use, and the potential for abuse is sky-high. Implanting artificial memories would never be a good thing to do under any circumstances.
Understanding the mechanics of memory may lead to breakthroughs which could cure diseases like Alzheimer's.
The direct cause of Alzheimer's is already well-known: plaques in the brain. Destroy the plaques early, and brain function will not be impaired. While the OP may unreasonably fear the repercussions of this research, claiming that it could lead to a cure for Alzheimers is going rather too far in assuaging his fears.
There is also a very good link between insulin overload and plaque formation (rather the inability of the brain tissue to breakdown plaque due to insulin overload eg it's too busy breaking down insulin). This in turn is brought about by obesity aka type 2 diabetes when looking at early onset Alzheimer's (old age also inhibits plaque breakdown).
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Wow. What happened to make you despise the rats so much?
Yes, they know that the plaques impair brain function by inference, they don't understand how, because no one knows what a memory is. Face it, we know a lot about the physical structure of the brain, but we don't really know how it works. Asserting that we understand the process of memory because we know a few things about a disease linked to memory is false equivalence. It's equally disingenuous to suggest that knowing more about how memories are formed, stored, and accessed would have no practical benefit when trying to understand and treat diseases which affect memory.
Right after we do conservatives. Start with the hard job, move to the easier ones. ;-)
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Actually, the plaque correlation is rather weak. Most like a soluble form of the protein do the damage, the plaques just being a precipitation of the soluble form., plaque removal do not correlate with reversal of the condition and plaque presence can be found in people with no notable cognitive decline.