The OP doesn't say that a single retinal cell transmits 10 million bits a second, but that the whole eye does. On top of that, while discussion of collition detection is pointless, thinking about the information a neuronal population can encode does have some merits. Although it's relatively pointless (at least now) to compare the eye to an ethernet, it has uses in comparing different neural populations.
The problem is that getting bitrates for neuronal populations is more of an art that a science. The sum total of information passed on by a neuron can not be computed simpley by it's spiking rate. Large numbers of parameters alter the actual chemical I/O relationship of a neuron. Resting membrane potential before spiking, whether it shows short term facilitation/depression etc...
Imagine if this immersive techneque really worked, and they tried it for other things; some how I don't think they would get away with showing rape PTSD victims Urotsukidoji - Legend of the Overfiend
That's actually quite an awesome paper. It seems that when a wound is made, it makes a low resistance shunt across skin, which normally has a voltage difference across it. This stimulates wound healing activity. The current peaks at 10 microA cm-2 and persisted at 4-8 microA cm-2, with all the current vector pointing towards the wound center.
This paper shows not only that that effect is easily demonstrated in vitro, but what are the molecular mediators of it, see the original article here.
Yeah, now I can see why NASA were so upset about the small $15 billion dollar budget they'll get next year; they have so many important things to do that are really going to benefit the average person.
Hmm, they say sarcasm is the lowest form of humor, and the escape of the witless mind... well I'm feeling witless.
Seriously, how many kids could have had access to better computers at high schools with the money this cost? Each one of the processors in this beast, that's 10,240 computers...
Yeah, I don't think they'll be much chance of getting DNA out of these samples, mitochondrial or otherwise. Still, from the morphology, some things might be able to be deduced. Definately growth rates, posture, relation to other reptiles.
Man, if drug companies are evil, this is where they are: hyping up compounds that have only begun to be tested in humans, just to pump up share prices (literally only begun, the announcement of the plan to test this drug in humans was made in May 2006). Although the preclinical, rodent data is good, drugs which have treated the transgenic models of Alzhiemer's have fallen flat many times before. It's worth noting that this same company had the drug PBT1 already being trialed in human Alzhimer's patients in 2003, but for some reason (*cough* probably toxic as hell *cough*) the trials were canceled, and this new drugs was rolled out.
Again, skepticism is the order of the day for pharmaceutical company press releases.
Fair enough comments. Maybe it's because I'm an electrophysiologist; but this kind of stuff doesn't seem that big to me. It probably got feed to the media so easily because it's not that complicated (at least on the surface, i.e. "brains first neurons discovered"). It's just in that same issue there were some things that seemed far more interested and novel to me, the paper on attention, and I would have thought the obesity obsessed media would have eaten up the paper on the role of hypothalamic Foxo1 and energy regulation.
Sure, Nature Neuroscience is the best neuroscience journal available, but that does not mean all its editorial descissions are sound. Just my opinion, but I don't really see the big deal. Only 1 of the authors is affiliated with a Russian Institute, so says nature:
Irina Bystron1, 2, Pasko Rakic3, Zoltán Molnár1 & Colin Blakemore1
1 Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, Oxfordshire OX13PT, UK.
2 Department of Morphology, Institute of Experimental Medicine, St. Petersburg, Russia.
3 Department of Neurobiology and Kavli Institute of Neuroscience, Yale University Medical School, New Haven, Connecticut 06520-8001, USA.
Why would they ship emreyoes or slices thereof around the world? Because the Russian lab might not have access to the antibodies and flourescent techneques needs. Also, having the name Rakic on your paper helps things get published in big outlets.
All this is evidence of is how efficient the marketing departments of large institutions like Yale and Oxford are. This paper is novel for one reason: it is in human embryos. Sure, they found a population of neurons earlier than, and different from, those in any other species, but the role of these neurons or even if they survive for long, is unknown. It is worth noting that these embryos were harvested from a Russian abortion clinic. Makes me wonder whether they shipped the whole embryo, the slices of the brain, or just the data over to Oxford.
-BilZ0r
www.ilikethings.net
Slashdot Mirror
The OP doesn't say that a single retinal cell transmits 10 million bits a second, but that the whole eye does. On top of that, while discussion of collition detection is pointless, thinking about the information a neuronal population can encode does have some merits. Although it's relatively pointless (at least now) to compare the eye to an ethernet, it has uses in comparing different neural populations.
The problem is that getting bitrates for neuronal populations is more of an art that a science. The sum total of information passed on by a neuron can not be computed simpley by it's spiking rate. Large numbers of parameters alter the actual chemical I/O relationship of a neuron. Resting membrane potential before spiking, whether it shows short term facilitation/depression etc...
...Or they could just give them MDMA
Imagine if this immersive techneque really worked, and they tried it for other things; some how I don't think they would get away with showing rape PTSD victims Urotsukidoji - Legend of the Overfiend
That's actually quite an awesome paper. It seems that when a wound is made, it makes a low resistance shunt across skin, which normally has a voltage difference across it. This stimulates wound healing activity. The current peaks at 10 microA cm-2 and persisted at 4-8 microA cm-2, with all the current vector pointing towards the wound center. This paper shows not only that that effect is easily demonstrated in vitro, but what are the molecular mediators of it, see the original article here.
Yeah, now I can see why NASA were so upset about the small $15 billion dollar budget they'll get next year; they have so many important things to do that are really going to benefit the average person. Hmm, they say sarcasm is the lowest form of humor, and the escape of the witless mind... well I'm feeling witless. Seriously, how many kids could have had access to better computers at high schools with the money this cost? Each one of the processors in this beast, that's 10,240 computers...
Yeah, I don't think they'll be much chance of getting DNA out of these samples, mitochondrial or otherwise. Still, from the morphology, some things might be able to be deduced. Definately growth rates, posture, relation to other reptiles.
Man, if drug companies are evil, this is where they are: hyping up compounds that have only begun to be tested in humans, just to pump up share prices (literally only begun, the announcement of the plan to test this drug in humans was made in May 2006). Although the preclinical, rodent data is good, drugs which have treated the transgenic models of Alzhiemer's have fallen flat many times before. It's worth noting that this same company had the drug PBT1 already being trialed in human Alzhimer's patients in 2003, but for some reason (*cough* probably toxic as hell *cough*) the trials were canceled, and this new drugs was rolled out. Again, skepticism is the order of the day for pharmaceutical company press releases.
Fair enough comments. Maybe it's because I'm an electrophysiologist; but this kind of stuff doesn't seem that big to me. It probably got feed to the media so easily because it's not that complicated (at least on the surface, i.e. "brains first neurons discovered"). It's just in that same issue there were some things that seemed far more interested and novel to me, the paper on attention, and I would have thought the obesity obsessed media would have eaten up the paper on the role of hypothalamic Foxo1 and energy regulation.
Sure, Nature Neuroscience is the best neuroscience journal available, but that does not mean all its editorial descissions are sound. Just my opinion, but I don't really see the big deal. Only 1 of the authors is affiliated with a Russian Institute, so says nature: Irina Bystron1, 2, Pasko Rakic3, Zoltán Molnár1 & Colin Blakemore1 1 Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, Oxfordshire OX13PT, UK. 2 Department of Morphology, Institute of Experimental Medicine, St. Petersburg, Russia. 3 Department of Neurobiology and Kavli Institute of Neuroscience, Yale University Medical School, New Haven, Connecticut 06520-8001, USA. Why would they ship emreyoes or slices thereof around the world? Because the Russian lab might not have access to the antibodies and flourescent techneques needs. Also, having the name Rakic on your paper helps things get published in big outlets.
All this is evidence of is how efficient the marketing departments of large institutions like Yale and Oxford are. This paper is novel for one reason: it is in human embryos. Sure, they found a population of neurons earlier than, and different from, those in any other species, but the role of these neurons or even if they survive for long, is unknown. It is worth noting that these embryos were harvested from a Russian abortion clinic. Makes me wonder whether they shipped the whole embryo, the slices of the brain, or just the data over to Oxford. -BilZ0r www.ilikethings.net