A hierarchical #Atlas of the human #cerebellum for functional precision #mapping
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Category: neuroscience – Page 202
Summary: A groundbreaking study by physicists and neuroscientists reveals that the connectivity among neurons stems from universal networking principles, not just biological specifics.
Analyzing various model organisms, researchers found a consistent “heavy-tailed” distribution of neural connections, guided by Hebbian dynamics, indicating that neuron connectivity relies on general network organization.
This discovery, transcending biology, potentially applies to non-biological networks like social interactions, offering insights into the fundamental nature of networking.
Alternative ways of powering, cooling, and constructing reactors could help get more nuclear energy on the grid.
I’ve got nuclear power on the brain this week.
Across mammalian species, brain waves are slower in deep cortical layers, while superficial layers generate faster rhythms.
Understanding why we overeat unhealthy foods has been a long-standing mystery. While we know food’s strong power influences our choices, the precise circuitry in our brains behind this is unclear. The vagus nerve sends internal sensory information from the gut to the brain about the nutritional value of food. But, the molecular basis of the reward in the brain associated with what we eat has been incompletely understood.
A study published in Cell Metabolism, by a team from the Monell Chemical Senses Center, unravels the internal neural wiring, revealing separate fat and sugar craving pathways, as well as a concerning result: Combining these pathways overly triggers our desire to eat more than usual.
“Food is nature’s ultimate reinforcer,” said Monell scientist Guillaume de Lartigue, Ph.D., lead author of the study. “But why fats and sugars are particularly appealing has been a puzzle. We’ve now identified nerve cells in the gut rather than taste cells in the mouth are a key driver. We found that distinct gut–brain pathways are recruited by fats and sugars, explaining why that donut can be so irresistible.”
Factor in along w/ weird stories of secret labs in places like California.
GX_P2V had infected the lungs, bones, eyes, tracheas and brains of the dead mice, the last of which was severe enough to ultimately cause the death of the animals.
In the days before their deaths, the mice had quickly lost weight, exhibited a hunched posture, and moved extremely sluggishly.
Most eerie of all, their eyes turned completely white the day before they died.
The incredible explosion in the power of artificial intelligence is evident in daily headlines proclaiming big breakthroughs. What are the remaining differences between machine and human intelligence? Could we simulate a brain on current computer hardware if we could write the software? What are the latest advancements in the world’s largest brain model? Participate in the discussion about what AI has done and how far it has yet to go, while discovering new technologies that might allow it to get there.
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
CHRIS ELIASMITH is the Director of the Centre for Theoretical Neuroscience (CTN) at the University of Waterloo. The CTN brings together researchers across many faculties who are interested in computational and theoretical models of neural systems. Dr Eliasmith was recently elected to the new Royal Society of Canada College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists, one of only 90 Canadian academics to receive this honour. He is also a Canada Research Chair in Theoretical Neuroscience. His book, ‘How to build a brain’ (Oxford, 2013), describes the Semantic Pointer Architecture for constructing large-scale brain models. His team built what is currently the world’s largest functional brain model, ‘Spaun’, and the first to demonstrate realistic behaviour under biological constraints. This ground-breaking work was published in Science (November, 2012) and has been featured by CNN, BBC, Der Spiegel, Popular Science, National Geographic and CBC among many other media outlets, and was awarded the NSERC Polayni Prize for 2015.
PAUL THAGARD is a philosopher, cognitive scientist, and author of many interdisciplinary books. He is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Waterloo, where he founded and directed the Cognitive Science Program. He is a graduate of the Universities of Saskatchewan, Cambridge, Toronto (PhD in philosophy) and Michigan (MS in computer science). He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the Cognitive Science Society, and the Association for Psychological Science. The Canada Council has awarded him a Molson Prize (2007) and a Killam Prize (2013). His books include: The Cognitive Science of Science: Explanation, Discovery, and Conceptual Change (MIT Press, 2012); The Brain and the Meaning of Life (Princeton University Press, 2010); Hot Thought: Mechanisms and Applications of Emotional Cognition (MIT Press, 2006); and Mind: Introduction to Cognitive Science (MIT Press, 1996; second edition, 2005). Oxford University Press will publish his 3-book Treatise on Mind and Society in early 2019.
UC San Diego researchers unveil a revolutionary brain monitoring system, enabling high-resolution, wireless recording in deep brain structures for diverse clinical applications.
UC San Diego introduces breakthrough wireless brain monitoring, paving the way for precision medicine in neurological disorders.
In a new paper published in Nature Neuroscience, Yale Department of Psychiatry’s George Dragoi, MD, PhD, describes how the brain forms a mcellular framework early in development which helps to define who we are and how we process experiences.
Based on years of research, Yale’s George Dragoi argues that our brains develop a cellular template soon after birth that defines how we perceive the world.
Recent research suggests that a number of neuronal characteristics, traditionally believed to stem from the cell body or soma, may actually originate from processes in the dendrites. This discovery has significant implications for the study of degenerative diseases and for understanding the different states of brain activity during sleep and wakefulness.
The brain is an intricate network comprising billions of neurons. Each neuron’s cell body, or soma, engages in simultaneous communication with thousands of other neurons through its synapses. These synapses act as links, facilitating the exchange of information. Additionally, each neuron receives incoming signals through its dendritic trees, which are highly branched and extend for great lengths, resembling the structure of a complex and vast arboreal network.
For the last 75 years, a core hypothesis of neuroscience has been that the basic computational element of the brain is the neuronal soma, where the long and ramified dendritic trees are only cables that enable them to collect incoming signals from its thousands of connecting neurons. This long-lasting hypothesis has now been called into question.