Lifeboat Foundation

Neuroscientists at the Bernstein Center Freiburg (BCF) of the University of Freiburg and the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm have decoded a significant process in the brain that in part contributes to the behavior of living beings. “One of the basic requirements for meaningful behavior is that networks in the brain produce precisely defined sequences of neuronal activity,” says Prof. Dr. Ad Aertsen of the University of Freiburg. The researchers have published the results of the cooperation with Professor Dr. Arvind Kumar of the KTH and Sebastian Spreizer, a doctoral candidate at the BCF, in the scientific journal PLoS Computational Biology.

Experiments in recent years have shown that the behavior of animals is accompanied by sequential activity of neurons in different areas of the brain. In the context of that finding, researchers world-wide have developed several models of possible mechanisms to explain how these ordered sequences come into existence. They are based primarily upon methods of supervised learning, in which the desired sequential activity is generated by means of a learning rule. Within this process, it turned out that neuronal networks can be trained to produce sequences of activity. “At the same time, we know that not every behavior is learned. Innate behavior suggests that the brain generates certain sequences without learning or training,” says Arvind Kumar, who directed the study.

Based on that, the researchers addressed the question of how an untrained brain can generate well-ordered sequences of activity. They found this requires two conditions to be met: First, a small portion of the neurons’ projected output – their connections to downstream neurons – have to prefer a specific direction. Second, neighboring neurons need to share that preferred direction. “That means that the connections of nerve cells depend on directional preferences and are spatially linked to each other. This is the key to the generation of sequential activity in neuronal networks,” explains Sebastian Spreizer. If the network is wired according to these rules, it creates a type of activity landscape similar to geographic hills and valleys. In the context of this metaphor, the sequences of neuronal activity are like the rivers in a landscape. Small changes in the spatial fabric of the nerve cells generate certain temporal and spatial sequences of neuronal activity.

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Batteries are nice to have in hybrid cars. They offer consistent voltage and energy storage to assist the gasoline engines. But electricity can be stored in other ways. A capacitor also stores electrons, but it releases them all at once. Power of this magnitude has never been harnessed by a car, so that’s why Lamborghini and MIT have announced a new patent for supercapacitors.

There’s a hole in the story of how our universe came to be. First, the universe inflated rapidly, like a balloon. Then, everything went boom.

But how those two periods are connected has eluded physicists. Now, a new study suggests a way to link the two epochs.

Free internet access must be considered as a human right, as people unable to get online—particularly in developing countries—lack meaningful ways to influence the global players shaping their everyday lives, according to a new study.

As political engagement increasingly takes place online, basic freedoms that many take for granted including free expression, freedom of information and freedom of assembly are undermined if some citizens have access to the internet and others do not.

New research reveals that the internet could be a key way of protecting other basic human rights such as life, liberty, and freedom from torture—a means of enabling billions of people to lead ‘minimally decent lives’.

A team of researchers from the University of Sheffield in the UK has identified a protein that plays a key role in the development of atherosclerosis, the leading cause of death worldwide.

The trouble with Tribbles 1

Researchers have demonstrated for the first time that the protein known as Tribbles 1 (TRIB1) is expressed by macrophage that is linked to the formation of the plaques that clog our arteries and eventually kill us. Macrophages are responsible for removing cellular garbage and other waste from our bodies to keep us healthy, and that includes the insides of our arteries.

While the public is still imagining the future to be very much like the past, the researchers at the forefront of genetics are planning to redesign human bodies, to make us more long-lived, more resilient to disease, more strong and (I hope) more intelligent.

In a talk at Exponential Medicine, Jane Metcalfe said that tools like gene editing and synthetic biology could make design the next big thing in medicine.

North Americans spent more than $936 million on vitamin D pills in 2017, doctors ordered more than 10 million laboratory tests for vitamin D for Medicare patients at a cost of $365 million in 2016, and 25 percent of older adults take vitamin D supplements. A Kaiser Health News investigation recently reported that the man most responsible for the obsession with vitamin D pills, Boston endocrinologist Michael Holick, has been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by supplement and drug manufacturers, the indoor-tanning industry and commercial laboratories that run blood tests for vitamin D (New York Times, August 18, 2018). Many doctors have been concerned about the recommendations for very high doses of vitamin D for a long time. In 2004, highly-respected Dr. Barbara Gilchrest, then head of Boston University’s Department of Dermatology, asked Holick to resign from the department. In 2014, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force reported that there is not enough evidence to recommend routine vitamin D testing. In 2015, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield reported that they had spent $33 million on 641,000 vitamin D tests.

No Benefits Shown in Recent Studies • Vitamin D pills were not shown to help prevent heart attacks or cancer: A study led by a Harvard researcher, Dr. Joanne Manson, followed 25,871 men and women for a median of 5.3 years. Participants who took vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol), 2000 IU per day, had no added protection from heart diseases or cancers (NEJM, November 10, 2018).

The cells in your body are like computer software: they’re “programmed” to carry out specific functions at specific times. If we can better understand this process, we could unlock the ability to reprogram cells ourselves, says computational biologist Sara-Jane Dunn. In a talk from the cutting-edge of science, she explains how her team is studying embryonic stem cells to gain a new understanding of the biological programs that power life — and develop “living software” that could transform medicine, agriculture and energy.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference, and was featured by our editors on the home page.