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Researchers find mathematical trick to combining planetary surface data.

Researchers have discovered a method for making high-resolution maps of planetary surfaces like the moon’s by combining available imagery and topography data.

Mapping the complex and diverse surface of a world like the moon in detailed resolution is challenging because laser altimeters, which measure changes in altitudes, operate at much lower resolution than cameras. And although photographs offer a sense of surface features, it’s difficult to translate images into specific heights and depths.

A model for autonomous underwater robots could help them navigate previously-unexplored waters.

Photoemisssion orbital tomography extended beyond pi orbitals.

Experimentally-generated map of copper surface using photoemission orbital tomography (top left) and the projected densities of states of σ and π orbitals (top right). The bianthracene investigated in the study (bottom left) and maps of its σ orbitals (bottom middle, right)

Continue reading “Visualising sigma orbitals opens path to new understanding of surface chemistry” »

For scientists searching for the brain’s ‘control room, an area called the claustrum has emerged as a compelling candidate. This little-studied deep brain structure is thought to be the place where multiple senses are brought together, attention is controlled, and consciousness arises. Observations in mice now support the role of the claustrum as a hub for coordinating activity across the brain. New research from the RIKEN Center for Brain Science (CBS) shows that slow-wave brain activity, a characteristic of sleep and resting states, is controlled by the claustrum. The synchronization of silent and active states across large parts of the brain by these slow waves could contribute to consciousness.

A serendipitous discovery actually led Yoshihiro Yoshihara, team leader at CBS, to investigate the claustrum. His lab normally studies the sense of smell and the detection of pheromones, but they chanced upon a genetically engineered mouse strain with a specific population of brain cells that was present only in the claustrum. These neurons could be turned on using optogenetic technology or selectively silenced through genetic manipulation, thus enabling the study of what turned out to be a vast, claustrum-controlled network. The study by Yoshihara and colleagues was published in Nature Neuroscience on May 11.

They started out by mapping the claustrum’s inputs and outputs and found that many higher-order brain areas send connections to the claustrum, such as those involved in sensation and motor control. Outgoing connections from the claustrum were broadly distributed across the brain, reaching numerous brain areas such as prefrontal, orbital, cingulate, motor, insular, and entorhinal cortices. “The claustrum is at the center of a widespread brain network, covering areas that are involved in cognitive processing,” says co-first author Kimiya Narikiyo. “It essentially reaches all higher brain areas and all types of neurons, making it a potential orchestrator of brain-wide activity.”

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Part of the cognitive neuroscience bitesize series. This is a follow-up of ‘basics of fMRI’ that considers exciting developments in mapping the human connect…

The table also shows the average normalized rank of transfer learning approaches. Hyperparameter transfer learning uses evaluation data from past HPO tasks in order to warmstart the current HPO task, which can result in significant speed-ups in practice.

Syne Tune supports transfer-learning-based HPO via an abstraction that maps a scheduler and transfer learning data to a warmstarted instance of the former. We consider the bounding-box and quantile-based ASHA, respectively referred to as ASHA-BB and ASHA-CTS. We also consider a zero-shot approach (ZS), which greedily selects hyperparameter configurations that complement previously considered ones, based on historical performances; and RUSH, which warmstarts ASHA with the best configurations found for previous tasks. As expected, we find that transfer learning approaches accelerate HPO.

Our experiments show that Syne Tune makes research on automated machine learning more efficient, reliable, and trustworthy. By making simulation on tabulated benchmarks a first-class citizen, it makes hyperparameter optimization accessible to researchers without massive computation budgets. By supporting advanced use cases, such as hyperparameter transfer learning, it allows better problem solving in practice.

Summary: Brain mapping study identifies important neural networks and their connections that appear to enhance the conscious experience.

Source: University of Tokyo

Science may be one step closer to understanding where consciousness resides in the brain. A new study shows the importance of certain types of neural connections in identifying consciousness.

Continue reading “Pinpointing Consciousness in Animal Brain Using Mouse ‘Brain Map’” »

National Hurricane Center data for Miami, Washington, D.C., and New York City show development happening in at-risk areas, even as climate change brings more frequent and intense storms.

RIYADH (BLOOMBERG) — Saudi Arabia wants to build a gigantic megastructure that contains a city for 9 million people, its crown prince announced on Monday (July 25).

The design takes the shape of two parallel buildings with mirrored surfaces, rising 500m above sea level — taller than the Empire State Building — and stretching horizontally for more than 100km.

They’re part of the prince’s US$500 billion (S$693 billion) Neom project, a plan to turn an expanse of desert the size of Belgium into a high-tech region.