This is so cool! I work just down the hall from Dr. Kaufman at CINJ. His lab is one of the labs developing these herpes virus cancer therapies. My lab uses vaccinia, the smallpox vaccine virus, doing similar research (I'm also working on a melanoma model). We use GM-CSF just like this one, but also add in some tumor-specific antigens to increase targeting to the tumors.
It's quite exciting stuff, and we even had a promising clinical trial against pancreatic cancer recently.
Completely agree. A google search of Konovalenko shows that she is a businesswoman in the anti-aging, cryonics, transhuman market. She makes money talking about increasing life spans and overcoming age and death. It seems kind of silly to listen to her opinion on the matter, as it is obviously biased.
Agreed. I'm not convinced they didn't just condition the mouse to fear that room by forcing an association of that room and pain, similar to me showing you a picture of Beiber and hitting you with a stick until every time you see a picture of him you cringe (maybe that's a bad example).
Regardless, it is pretty interesting that they could pin-point the precise location where the memory of the room was stored and force that negative association at the neuronal level. Not quite an implanted memory, but still cool.
I started playing the campaign for Heart of the Swarm today, and am very pleased with it so far. The cinematic sequences are really well done, and it has a great storyline so far.
Previous models of this same device did actually provide some sensation.
"An earlier, portable model of the hand was temporarily attached to Pierpaolo Petruzziello in 2009, who lost half his arm in a car accident. He was able to move the bionic hand’s fingers, clench them into a fist and hold objects. He said that he could feel the sensation of needles pricked into the hand’s palm." (http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/a-sensational-breakthrough-the-first-bionic-hand-that-can-feel-8498622.html)
So they have pretty good reason to hope that it will provide some feeling at least.
Reminds me of an article I saw from BBC News (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21142870) showing that one of the key differences between dogs and wolves was in brain development. Dog are essentially mentally handicapped and stuck in a permanent state of puppyhood. Maybe that's why they don't move in "energy efficient" ways. Either that or running is just fun.
So when people need to run, they run, but if they don't need to run, they don't? Is that really all this is saying? I sure hope there is some more technical benefit to the field of prostheses or this study was probably a waste of money.
"I before e except after c and when sounding like a as in neighbor and weigh, and on weekends and holidays and all throughout May, and you'll always be wrong no matter what you say!"
"That's a hard rule. That's a— that's a rough rule."
- Comedian Brian Regan
Of how life imitates sci-fi. I distinctly remember a research project in the computer game Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri called the Human Brain Project. If I'm remembering right it turned normal citizens into super smart "Talents". It will be interesting to see the effect of the real world version.
It seems like every couple of months some solar cell breaks a different barrier. A slashdot story from November (http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/11/03/2010244/solar-panel-breaks-third-of-a-sun-efficiency-barrier) clocked some solar panel as being 33.5% efficient. Are they measuring on different scales or definitions of efficiency or something?
"Inconceivable!"
You're right that it isn't really "cheating", but it is less fun (for me at least) to play against an opponent with an unfair advantage
Not being able to "solve" games like chess like you can with Tic-Tac-Toe (http://xkcd.com/832/) is what makes them fun and playable. Otherwise it quickly gets boring. It's also why it isn't always as fun to play against the computer on really high levels. They can cheat and solve the next bajillion moves.
Because it would suck to have that many wires connecting all the PaperTabs together. And while it's flexibility makes it less likely to break when dropped, isn't there a risk of it being torn, or mistaken for regular paper and thrown away or shredded?
Also true. But if it's a known species they could find it and sequence it to compare. If it matches you're good, but if it isn't a match you know to keep looking for something new.
No. That's why sequencing DNA that doesn't match to any known species would reveal a previously unknown species. Based on sequence homology scientists could probably then figure out the genus of the new species, since the majority of the DNA would be similar.
Me neither. It's annoying, sure, but I think it's a great deal. That's why Amazon can sell Kindle's with ads and free app developers can stay in business. It works great.
The most relevant web of 2012 for me would have to be the one I started recently with my brother: www.demonarchives.com It has been a blast turning my story into something worth sharing (I hope).
According to the article this only works with people who have had a degenerative eye disease called retinal pigmentosis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retinitis_pigmentosa), which slowly destroys the person's peripheral vision. It wouldn't work with people who didn't have functional optic nerves to begin with. I think it's more a case of braille being simpler to transmit via electrodes (number and position of dots compared to the entire shape of a letter) as other commenters have mentioned.
If they inject this into the blood stream, definitely. But they're probably putting it into connective tissue, so that the drug can diffuse into the blood while the sponge stays and degrades.
Slashdot Mirror
This is so cool! I work just down the hall from Dr. Kaufman at CINJ. His lab is one of the labs developing these herpes virus cancer therapies. My lab uses vaccinia, the smallpox vaccine virus, doing similar research (I'm also working on a melanoma model). We use GM-CSF just like this one, but also add in some tumor-specific antigens to increase targeting to the tumors. It's quite exciting stuff, and we even had a promising clinical trial against pancreatic cancer recently.
Completely agree. A google search of Konovalenko shows that she is a businesswoman in the anti-aging, cryonics, transhuman market. She makes money talking about increasing life spans and overcoming age and death. It seems kind of silly to listen to her opinion on the matter, as it is obviously biased.
Agreed. I'm not convinced they didn't just condition the mouse to fear that room by forcing an association of that room and pain, similar to me showing you a picture of Beiber and hitting you with a stick until every time you see a picture of him you cringe (maybe that's a bad example).
Regardless, it is pretty interesting that they could pin-point the precise location where the memory of the room was stored and force that negative association at the neuronal level. Not quite an implanted memory, but still cool.
If you try using the demo calculator as of 11:00 EST the website is overloaded and gives an error message. Love me the power of the internets.
Ouch....two overrated downvotes. I shan't share my personal experiences that relate to the topic at hand anymore.
I started playing the campaign for Heart of the Swarm today, and am very pleased with it so far. The cinematic sequences are really well done, and it has a great storyline so far.
Previous models of this same device did actually provide some sensation. "An earlier, portable model of the hand was temporarily attached to Pierpaolo Petruzziello in 2009, who lost half his arm in a car accident. He was able to move the bionic hand’s fingers, clench them into a fist and hold objects. He said that he could feel the sensation of needles pricked into the hand’s palm." (http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/a-sensational-breakthrough-the-first-bionic-hand-that-can-feel-8498622.html) So they have pretty good reason to hope that it will provide some feeling at least.
Reminds me of an article I saw from BBC News (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21142870) showing that one of the key differences between dogs and wolves was in brain development. Dog are essentially mentally handicapped and stuck in a permanent state of puppyhood. Maybe that's why they don't move in "energy efficient" ways. Either that or running is just fun.
So when people need to run, they run, but if they don't need to run, they don't? Is that really all this is saying? I sure hope there is some more technical benefit to the field of prostheses or this study was probably a waste of money.
"I before e except after c and when sounding like a as in neighbor and weigh, and on weekends and holidays and all throughout May, and you'll always be wrong no matter what you say!" "That's a hard rule. That's a— that's a rough rule." - Comedian Brian Regan
Of how life imitates sci-fi. I distinctly remember a research project in the computer game Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri called the Human Brain Project. If I'm remembering right it turned normal citizens into super smart "Talents". It will be interesting to see the effect of the real world version.
It seems like every couple of months some solar cell breaks a different barrier. A slashdot story from November (http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/11/03/2010244/solar-panel-breaks-third-of-a-sun-efficiency-barrier) clocked some solar panel as being 33.5% efficient. Are they measuring on different scales or definitions of efficiency or something?
"Inconceivable!" You're right that it isn't really "cheating", but it is less fun (for me at least) to play against an opponent with an unfair advantage
Not being able to "solve" games like chess like you can with Tic-Tac-Toe (http://xkcd.com/832/) is what makes them fun and playable. Otherwise it quickly gets boring. It's also why it isn't always as fun to play against the computer on really high levels. They can cheat and solve the next bajillion moves.
Because it would suck to have that many wires connecting all the PaperTabs together. And while it's flexibility makes it less likely to break when dropped, isn't there a risk of it being torn, or mistaken for regular paper and thrown away or shredded?
Also true. But if it's a known species they could find it and sequence it to compare. If it matches you're good, but if it isn't a match you know to keep looking for something new.
No. That's why sequencing DNA that doesn't match to any known species would reveal a previously unknown species. Based on sequence homology scientists could probably then figure out the genus of the new species, since the majority of the DNA would be similar.
I'm guessing "you'll" only counted as 1.5 words to the counter.
Me neither. It's annoying, sure, but I think it's a great deal. That's why Amazon can sell Kindle's with ads and free app developers can stay in business. It works great.
They'll try to turn it into a marketing strategy, with constant reminders to update to a newer version every time you open your "free" version.
The most relevant web of 2012 for me would have to be the one I started recently with my brother: www.demonarchives.com It has been a blast turning my story into something worth sharing (I hope).
No more shafts leading directly to the core, please.
According to the article this only works with people who have had a degenerative eye disease called retinal pigmentosis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retinitis_pigmentosa), which slowly destroys the person's peripheral vision. It wouldn't work with people who didn't have functional optic nerves to begin with. I think it's more a case of braille being simpler to transmit via electrodes (number and position of dots compared to the entire shape of a letter) as other commenters have mentioned.
If they inject this into the blood stream, definitely. But they're probably putting it into connective tissue, so that the drug can diffuse into the blood while the sponge stays and degrades.
My favorite part of the article is the picture of custom sponge shapes. Can I get my insulin sponge-shot shaped like a Lucky Charms marshmallow? http://www.geek.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/cryogel_sponge_02.gif