Lifeboat Foundation

A tiny but important area in the middle of the brain acts as a switch that determines when an animal is willing to work for a reward and when it stops working, according to a study published Aug. 31 in the journal Current Biology.

“The study changes how we think about this particular brain region,” said senior author Melissa Warden, assistant professor and Miriam M. Salpeter Fellow in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior, which is shared between the College of Arts and Sciences and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

“It has implications for psychiatric disorders, particularly depression and anxiety,” Warden said.

The human brain is an amazing computing machine. Weighing only three pounds or so, it can process information a thousand times faster than the fastest supercomputer, store a thousand times more information than a powerful laptop, and do it all using no more energy than a 20-watt lightbulb.

Researchers are trying to replicate this success using soft, flexible organic materials that can operate like biological neurons and someday might even be able to interconnect with them. Eventually, soft “neuromorphic” computer chips could be implanted directly into the brain, allowing people to control an artificial arm or a computer monitor simply by thinking about it.

Like real neurons — but unlike conventional computer chips — these new devices can send and receive both chemical and electrical signals. “Your brain works with chemicals, with neurotransmitters like dopamine and serotonin. Our materials are able to interact electrochemically with them,” says Alberto Salleo, a materials scientist at Stanford University who wrote about the potential for organic neuromorphic devices in the 2021 Annual Review of Materials Research.

As a scientist, I am driven by the power of technological breakthroughs to make positive change for humanity. While I also take immense pleasure in the artistic/creative aspects of technology design, my motivation is centered on helping people and on protecting the future of the human species. For this reason, I am interested in a wide array of contemporary challenges as described in this outline. Because I am a synthetic biologist and synthetic biology has many applications, I have the ability to explore solutions to such diverse challenges despite their highly multidisciplinary nature.

That said, one of the tools in any good researcher’s repertoire is collaboration. Since I am just one person, my knowledge can only go so deep in so many areas. Interdisciplinary projects are much more likely to succeed when experts from multiple areas work together. So, I leverage collaboration extensively when carrying out my projects and will continue to do so in the future.

It should be noted that, though I am publicly presenting a number of conceptual explanations of possible solutions to important problems via this list, I have deliberately stated them in somewhat vague language to prevent their public disclosure from precluding outside investment.

Researchers looking to synthesize a brighter and more stable nanoparticle for optical applications found that their creation instead exhibited a more surprising property: bursts of superfluorescence that occurred at both room temperature and regular intervals. The work could lead to the development of faster microchips, neurosensors, or materials for use in quantum computing applications, as well as a number of biological studies.

Superfluorescence occurs when atoms within a material synchronize and simultaneously emit a short but intense burst of light. The property is valuable for quantum optical applications, but extremely difficult to achieve at room temperatures and for intervals long enough to be useful.

The material in question—lanthanide-doped upconversion nanoparticle, or UCNP—was synthesized by the research team in an effort to create a “brighter” optical material. They produced hexagonal ceramic crystals ranging from 50 nanometers (nm) to 500 nm in size and began testing their lasing properties, which resulted in several impressive breakthroughs.

Cutting intricate patterns as small as several billionths of a meter deep and wide, the focused ion beam (FIB) is an essential tool for deconstructing and imaging tiny industrial parts to ensure they were fabricated correctly. When a beam of ions, typically of the heavy metal gallium, bombards the material to be machined, the ions eject atoms from the surface—a process known as milling—to sculpt the workpiece.

Beyond its traditional uses in the semiconductor industry, the FIB has also become a critical tool for fabricating prototypes of complex three-dimensional devices, ranging from lenses that focus light to conduits that channel fluid. Researchers also use the FIB to dissect biological and material samples to image their internal structure.

However, the FIB process has been limited by a trade-off between high speed and fine resolution. On the one hand, increasing the ion current allows a FIB to cut into the workpiece deeper and faster. On the other hand, the increased current carries a larger number of positively charged ions, which electrically repel each other and defocus the beam. A larger, diffuse beam, which can be about 100 nanometers in diameter or 10 times wider than a typical narrow beam, not only limits the ability to fabricate fine patterns but can also damage the workpiece at the perimeter of the milled region. As a result, the FIB has not been the process of choice for those trying to machine many tiny parts in a hurry.

The flow of time from the past to the future is a central feature of how we experience the world. But precisely how this phenomenon, known as the arrow of time, arises from the microscopic interactions among particles and cells is a mystery—one that researchers at the CUNY Graduate Center Initiative for the Theoretical Sciences (ITS) are helping to unravel with the publication of a new paper in the journal Physical Review Letters. The findings could have important implications in a variety of disciplines, including physics, neuroscience, and biology.

Fundamentally, the arrow of time arises from the second law of thermodynamics: the principle that microscopic arrangements of physical systems tend to increase in randomness, moving from order to disorder. The more disordered a system becomes, the more difficult it is for it to find its way back to an ordered state, and the stronger the arrow of time. In short, the universe’s tendency toward disorder is the fundamental reason why we experience time flowing in one direction.

“The two questions our team had were, if we looked at a particular system, would we be able to quantify the strength of its arrow of time, and would we be able to sort out how it emerges from the micro scale, where cells and neurons interact, to the whole system?” said Christopher Lynn, the paper’s first author and a postdoctoral fellow with the ITS program. “Our findings provide the first step toward understanding how the arrow of time that we experience in daily life emerges from these more microscopic details.”

Circa 2019 face_with_colon_three Biological singularity here we come :3.

Scientific Reports volume 9, Article number: 12,181 (2019) Cite this article.

“Everyone can quantum.”

Chinese multinational technology company Baidu just released its first quantum computer on Thursday. The first superconducting quantum computer, “Qian Shi” can integrate hardware, software, and many applications. Baidu also introduced the world’s first all-platform quantum hardware-software integration solution — Liang Xi — that provides access to various quantum chips via mobile app, PC, and cloud.

Qian Shi is expected to solve data that a standard computer cannot calculate and problems that cannot be solved. This development is also thought to be a breakthrough in artificial intelligence, computational biology, material simulation, and financial technology.

Continue reading “Baidu Releases Superconducting Quantum Computer and World’s First All-Platform Integration Solution, Making Quantum Computing Within Reach” »

A new study by theoretical physicists has made progress toward identifying how particles and cells give rise to large-scale dynamics that we experience as the passage of time.

A central feature of how we experience the world is the flow of time from the past to the future. But it is a mystery precisely how this phenomenon, known as the arrow of time, arises from the microscopic interactions among particles and cells. Researchers at the CUNY Graduate Center Initiative for the Theoretical Sciences (ITS) are helping to unravel this enigma with the publication of a new paper in the journal Physical Review Letters. The findings could have important implications in a wide range of disciplines, including physics, neuroscience, and biology.

Fundamentally, the arrow of time emerges from the second law of thermodynamics. This is the principle that microscopic arrangements of physical systems tend to increase in randomness, moving from order to disorder. The more disordered a system becomes, the more difficult it is for it to find its way back to an ordered state, and the stronger the arrow of time. In short, the universe’s propensity toward disorder is the fundamental reason why we experience time flowing in one direction.