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Nov 6, 2023

Complex brain activity detected in dying patients

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience, robotics/AI

The study, led by Jimo Borjigin, associate professor of molecular and integrative physiology and neurology at Michigan, was very small, featuring only four patients. But the findings echo animal model studies, where the presence of gamma waves in dying brains has also been observed, including in a previous study in rats that Borjigin and colleagues ran a decade earlier.


“These data demonstrate that the surge of gamma power and connectivity observed in animal models of cardiac arrest can be observed in select patients during the process of dying,” the researchers wrote in their paper, published in PNAS.

What are gamma waves? Gamma waves are high-frequency brain waves researchers believe represent multiple areas of the brain working together in complex thoughts. Take, for example, combining the sight, sound, and smell of a car to get a full picture of the vehicle, Ajmal Zemmar, a neurosurgeon at the University of Louisville uninvolved with the study, told Science.

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Nov 6, 2023

Neural Implant Translates Brainwaves Into Words

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, cyborgs, robotics/AI

Summary: A new speech prosthetic offers hope for those with speech-impairing neurological disorders.

By converting brain signals into speech using high-density sensors and machine learning, the technology represents a significant advancement over current slower communication aids.

Though still in early stages, the device has achieved a 40% accuracy in decoding spoken data during limited trials and is moving towards a cordless design.

Nov 6, 2023

Dendrites, Not Just Soma, Drive Brain Computation

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

Summary: Researchers challenge a 75-year-old neuroscience hypothesis, suggesting dendrites play a crucial role in brain computation, not just the neuronal soma.

Experiments conducted under non-physiological conditions revealed that neuron features like firing frequency and stimulation threshold are controlled by dendrites.

This groundbreaking discovery implies that dendrites could be pivotal in learning processes and may even influence our understanding of brain states and degenerative diseases.

Nov 6, 2023

New evidence strongly suggests Indonesia’s Gunung Padang is oldest known pyramid

Posted by in category: futurism

A team of archaeologists, geophysicists, geologists, and paleontologists affiliated with multiple institutions in Indonesia has found evidence showing that Gunung Padang is the oldest known pyramid in the world. In their paper published in the journal Archaeological Prospection, the group describes their multi-year study of the cultural heritage site.

Gunung Padang has for many years been considered a megalithic structure—it sits on top of an extinct volcano in West Java, Indonesia, and is considered by locals to be a sacred site. In 1998, it was declared to be a cultural heritage site. For many years there has been disagreement regarding the nature of the hill. Some have suggested it was made naturally with humans adding some adornments on top, while others have argued that evidence has suggested the hill was all or mostly man-made.

For this new study, the research team conducted a long-term, scientific study of the structure. Over the years 2011 to 2015, they studied the structure using seismic tomography, electrical resistivity tomography and ground-penetrating radar. They also drilled down into the hill and collected that allowed them to use radiocarbon dating techniques to learn the ages of the layers that make up the hill.

Nov 6, 2023

New treatment reverses epigenetic age of rats by 67.4%

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, genetics, life extension

Equivalent to an 80-year-old human reverting to the age of 26.


A groundbreaking study into anti-aging has reported significant rejuvenation effects using exosomes, tiny particles which can be extracted from biological fluids such as blood plasma.

Old and young rat. Image generated by DALL·E 3

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Nov 6, 2023

Endeavour assembly at Science Center starts with lifting 52-ton rockets into place

Posted by in categories: science, space travel

The space shuttle Endeavour’s twin giant rockets will be hoisted by crane next week and affixed into place atop the craft’s aft skirts in a first step of assembling a full-stack configuration of the shuttle at the future Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center.

The two solid rocket motors—each weighing 104,000 pounds and the size of a Boeing 757 fuselage—were transported by truck in early October from Mojave Air and Space Port to the science center in South Los Angeles.

“It’s actually pretty exciting. This is the first big tall pieces of the stack going into the building,” California Science Center President Jeffrey Rudolph said. Each measures 116 feet and makes up most of the length of the 149-foot solid rocket boosters. At liftoff, the white solid rocket boosters were set underneath Endeavour’s wings and produced more than 80% of the lift during takeoff.

Nov 6, 2023

AI Pioneer Kai-Fu Lee Builds $1 Billion Startup in Eight Months

Posted by in categories: business, finance, robotics/AI

01. AI’s model outperforms Meta’s Llama 2 on certain metricsStartup to offer open-source model; proprietary options laterA Chinese startup founded by computer scientist Kai-Fu Lee has become a unicorn in less than eight months on the strength of a new open-source artificial-intelligence model that outstrips Silicon Valley’s best, on at least certain metrics.

The company, 01.AI, has reached a valuation of more than $1 billion after a funding round that included Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s cloud unit, Lee said in an interview. The chief executive officer of venture firm Sinovation Ventures will also be CEO of the new startup. He began assembling the team for 01.AI in March and started… More.


Bloomberg connects decision makers to a dynamic network of data, delivering business and financial information, news and insights globally.

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Nov 6, 2023

Chatbots May ‘Hallucinate’ More Often Than Many Realize

Posted by in categories: robotics/AI, space

When summarizing facts, ChatGPT technology makes things up about 3 percent of the time, according to research from a new start-up. A Google system’s rate was 27 percent.

When the San Francisco start-up OpenAI unveiled its ChatGPT online chatbot late last year.

When Google introduced a similar chatbot several weeks later, it spewed nonsense about the James Webb telescope. The next day, Microsoft’s new Bing chatbot offered up all sorts of bogus information about the Gap, Mexican nightlife and the… More.

Nov 6, 2023

Micron taps Taiwan and Japan to make advanced AI memory chips

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Micron President and CEO Sanjay Mehrotra, speaking at the grand opening of the company’s latest advanced production and test… More.


TAICHUNG, Taiwan — U.S. memory chip maker Micron is doubling down on Taiwan and Japan as the key production bases for its cutting-edge products as it battles South Korean rivals to capture demand from the AI boom.

Taiwan and Japan play vital roles in the production of Micron’s most advanced dynamic random-access (DRAM) memory and high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, Naga Chandrasekaran, Micron’s senior vice president of technology development, told reporters on Monday. Advanced DRAM and HBM chips are vital for enabling powerful generative AI computing applications such as ChatGPT and Bard.

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Nov 6, 2023

The Vital Role Of Partnerships In Scaling Artificial Intelligence

Posted by in categories: business, robotics/AI

An effective way of tackling this challenge is to find friendly partners who can help bear the burden. This means other businesses and organizations with the skills you’re missing or that specialize in the support infrastructure you need, be it in engineering, logistics, marketing or sales.

This is particularly essential when dealing with AI. It’s certainly getting easier for companies to start exploring and benefiting from AI. But fully integrating it in a business across every viable use case is still expensive, time-consuming and often dependent on the availability of highly skilled specialists.

Businesses rely on trusted networks of consultants, suppliers, and resellers to create these partnership ecosystems. Partnership working in the context of AI is going to be particularly important for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) that generate the majority of GDP and account for 90 percent of global business activity. Ultimately, it’s likely to be these businesses that will determine whether AI achieves its projected $4.4 trillion potential.