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Apr 20, 2020

Scientists create tiny devices that work like the human brain

Posted by in categories: computing, neuroscience

Compared to a conventional computer, this device has a learning capability that is not software-based.

Apr 20, 2020

Astronomers Find a Beautiful Six-Planet System in Almost Perfect Orbital Harmony

Posted by in category: space

The star itself is about the same mass and a little larger than the Sun — a minority in our exoplanet hunts. It’s orbited by six planets: a super-Earth and five mini-Neptunes.

After monitoring it for seven years, astronomers have discovered that all six of those planets are orbiting HD 158259 in almost perfect orbital resonance. This discovery could help us to better understand the mechanisms of planetary system formation, and how they end up in the configurations we see.

Apr 20, 2020

Deeper Dive Into Bill Gates

Posted by in category: futurism

Ladies Monday with ReallyGraceful going a bit further into Bill Gates.


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Apr 20, 2020

Turning on the ‘off switch’ in cancer cells

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

A team of scientists led by the University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center and Case Comprehensive Cancer Center has identified the binding site where drug compounds could activate a key braking mechanism against the runaway growth of many types of cancer.

The discovery marks a critical step toward developing a potential new class of anti– drugs that enhance the activity of a prevalent family of tumor suppressor proteins, the authors say.

The findings, which appear in the leading life sciences journal Cell, are less a story of what than how.

Apr 20, 2020

New therapeutic options for multiple sclerosis in sight

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is known as “the disease with a thousand faces” because symptoms and progression can vary dramatically from patient to patient. But every MS patient has one thing in common: Cells of their body’s own immune system migrate to the brain, where they destroy the myelin sheath—the protective outer layer of the nerve fibers. As a result, an electrical short circuit occurs, preventing the nerve signals from being transmitted properly.

Many MS medications impair immune memory

Researchers don’t yet know exactly which are involved in stripping away the myelin sheath. Autoreactive T and B , which wrongly identify the myelin sheath as a foreign body, travel to the brain and initiate the disease. “Up until now, MS drugs have essentially targeted these T and B cells, both of which are part of the acquired ,” says Dr. Alexander Mildner, a scientist at the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine in the Helmholtz Association (MDC) and the senior author of the paper now published in Nature Immunology.

Apr 20, 2020

Insightful ideas can trigger orgasmic brain signals, finds study

Posted by in categories: evolution, neuroscience

New psychology study shows that some people have increased brain sensitivity for “aha moments”.

The researchers scanned brains of participants and noticed orgasm-like signals during insights.

The scientists think this evolutionary adaptation drives creation of science and culture.

Continue reading “Insightful ideas can trigger orgasmic brain signals, finds study” »

Apr 20, 2020

Researchers unveil electronics that mimic the human brain in efficient learning

Posted by in categories: biological, computing, engineering, nanotechnology, neuroscience

Only 10 years ago, scientists working on what they hoped would open a new frontier of neuromorphic computing could only dream of a device using miniature tools called memristors that would function/operate like real brain synapses.

But now a team at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has discovered, while on their way to better understanding protein , how to use these biological, electricity conducting filaments to make a neuromorphic memristor, or “memory transistor,” device. It runs extremely efficiently on very low power, as brains do, to carry signals between neurons. Details are in Nature Communications.

As first author Tianda Fu, a Ph.D. candidate in electrical and , explains, one of the biggest hurdles to neuromorphic computing, and one that made it seem unreachable, is that most conventional computers operate at over 1 volt, while the brain sends signals called action potentials between neurons at around 80 millivolts—many times lower. Today, a decade after early experiments, memristor voltage has been achieved in the range similar to conventional computer, but getting below that seemed improbable, he adds.

Apr 20, 2020

New Way To Levitate Objects Discovered

Posted by in categories: engineering, nanotechnology, quantum physics

O,.o circa 2007.


Theoretical physicists at the University of St. Andrews have created ‘incredible levitation effects’ by engineering the force of nature which normally causes objects to stick together by quantum force. By reversing this phenomenon, known as ‘Casimir force’, the scientists hope to solve the problem of tiny objects sticking together in existing novel nanomachines.

Professor Ulf Leonhardt and Dr Thomas Philbin of the University’s School of Physics & Astronomy believe that they can engineer the Casimir force of quantum physics to cause an object to repel rather than attract another in a vacuum.

Casimir force (discovered in 1948 and first measured in 1997) can be demonstrated in a gecko’s ability to stick to a surface with just one toe. However, it can cause practical problems in nanotechnology, and ways of preventing tiny objects from sticking to each other is the source of much interest.

Apr 20, 2020

DARPA-funded microchip technology optimizes convalescent plasma therapy for COVID-19 patients

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, computing, health

:oooo.


Doctors and researchers are just beginning to document and understand the effects of heart disease in complicating and endangering recovery from the COVID-19 virus, as well as the potential impact of COVID-19 on the heart. In a new Loyola Medicine video, “Heart Disease and COVID-19,” cardiologist Asim Babar, MD, recommends that individuals with heart disease take especially good care of their health and heart during this pandemic.

Continue reading “DARPA-funded microchip technology optimizes convalescent plasma therapy for COVID-19 patients” »

Apr 20, 2020

Researchers balance Casimir effects, make tiny hoverboard

Posted by in category: transportation

Circa 2019


Thanks to quantum mechanics, empty space can both push and suck.