This Week In Science

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13022755:LE.Skiing said:

The Hubble telescope is insane. What's even more mind-blowing and humbling is how many stars and planets would be in this image; approx 10,000 galaxies, each likely containing hundreds of billions of stars...

heic1411a.jpg


We can't be alone
 
This thread is awesome.

13023441:las. said:
The Hubble telescope is insane. What's even more mind-blowing and humbling is how many stars and planets would be in this image; approx 10,000 galaxies, each likely containing hundreds of billions of stars...

heic1411a.jpg


We can't be alone

This is one of my favorite photos ever and always puts things in perspective for me. Its simply incredible...
 
a little bit more on the technology side of things[The Machine: New Type Of Computer Capable Of Calculating 640TBs Of Data In One Billionth Of A Second, Could Revolutionize Computing.]. Next generation of gaming consoles are going to kick so much ass. Also can't wait for them to develop this for mobile devices.
 
13042318:shocker611 said:
While pretty badass, its been pretty obvious this was coming for like the past 10 years. Not really a big breakthrough

Brain interface research and technology has been around for some time, but never like this. This is a massive step forward, and a genuinely huge breakthrough. Obviously this is all at quite a relatively primitive stage, but just imagine where this will be 50, even 20 years from now. One of the more exciting implications of something like this, too, is how it shouldn't need to be restricted to the control of one's own body.


[VIDEO]http://youtu.be/1QPiF4-iu6g[/VIDEO]
 
13042520:las. said:
Brain interface research and technology has been around for some time, but never like this. This is a massive step forward, and a genuinely huge breakthrough. Obviously this is all at quite a relatively primitive stage, but just imagine where this will be 50, even 20 years from now. One of the more exciting implications of something like this, too, is how it shouldn't need to be restricted to the control of one's own body.

My point is that it isn't a huge step, there has been a million little steps previous to this that made this not that big of a step. I would argue we could have done this years ago it would have just been unbelievably crude, which this is as well. We've had the ability to decode movements for a while (almost 10 years) and have had the ability to re-innervate specific nerves for just as long. It was just a matter of time before we put the two together. I would argue current control of prosthesis is quite a bit more interesting than this because we can define much more intricate movements than sending an overwhelming signal to a nerve to produce a bulk reaction of the wrist (which is practically all this is). This is very similar to that classic high school experiment of shocking the shit out of a nerve and producing a muscle twitch, its just that electrical shock is sent by the brain instead of a push on a computer. Definitely still cool to watch though, and at least gets the public thinking of the direction this could go with a bunch more funding and 20+ years
 
13043125:shocker611 said:
My point is that it isn't a huge step, there has been a million little steps previous to this that made this not that big of a step. I would argue we could have done this years ago it would have just been unbelievably crude, which this is as well. We've had the ability to decode movements for a while (almost 10 years) and have had the ability to re-innervate specific nerves for just as long. It was just a matter of time before we put the two together. I would argue current control of prosthesis is quite a bit more interesting than this because we can define much more intricate movements than sending an overwhelming signal to a nerve to produce a bulk reaction of the wrist (which is practically all this is). This is very similar to that classic high school experiment of shocking the shit out of a nerve and producing a muscle twitch, its just that electrical shock is sent by the brain instead of a push on a computer. Definitely still cool to watch though, and at least gets the public thinking of the direction this could go with a bunch more funding and 20+ years

It has been baby steps until now, but I don't think that should detract from how massive of a breakthrough this is. Prosthesis and all developing technology surrounding it is very exciting, especially considering where it begin and how far it's come, but in my opinion this is the next step up, and I think the implications of this and what has now been made possible far outweigh what prosthetics has, so far, brought to the table. I do see what you mean though.
 
13043367:las. said:
It has been baby steps until now, but I don't think that should detract from how massive of a breakthrough this is. Prosthesis and all developing technology surrounding it is very exciting, especially considering where it begin and how far it's come, but in my opinion this is the next step up, and I think the implications of this and what has now been made possible far outweigh what prosthetics has, so far, brought to the table. I do see what you mean though.

Yeah hopefully it will go somewhere eventually. Unfortunately the foreign body response to any kind of implanted electrode is ridiculously bad to where it would have to be removed (likely days, a month maximum) after very limited use even if we did get a fully working system going. To me the more promising technique would be a tissue engineering (possibly stem cell) approach to repair the damaged nerves in the CNS, as it would not have nearly the same issues with the foreign body response and once it is fixed you would be pretty much good to go. One of my friends actually just did a study on these peripheral implants and they found that implanting them actually sent signals to the brain that prevents neurogenesis (in other words new brain formation) significantly, meaning these devices actually make you dumber, and angrier, while they are implanted in you.
 
13043538:shocker611 said:
Yeah hopefully it will go somewhere eventually. Unfortunately the foreign body response to any kind of implanted electrode is ridiculously bad to where it would have to be removed (likely days, a month maximum) after very limited use even if we did get a fully working system going. To me the more promising technique would be a tissue engineering (possibly stem cell) approach to repair the damaged nerves in the CNS, as it would not have nearly the same issues with the foreign body response and once it is fixed you would be pretty much good to go. One of my friends actually just did a study on these peripheral implants and they found that implanting them actually sent signals to the brain that prevents neurogenesis (in other words new brain formation) significantly, meaning these devices actually make you dumber, and angrier, while they are implanted in you.

Right, yeah re-engineering existing pathways is definitely a far superior means of nerve function repair than creating an entirely new artificial path, which makes sense really
 
13048866:louie.mirags said:
brain cancer vaccine!! whatttttt

Haha yeah, bit wild that one. Should read as "new vaccine may raise immune response against specific strain of cancer"
 
This is very interesting

"Studies: Addiction starts with an overcorrection in the brain"

http://news.byu.edu/archive14-jul-addiction.aspx

"Neuroscientists find cause of withdrawal symptoms in addicts"

Copied and pasted:

People that go into withdrawal start secreting a protein that promotes neuron growth in the motivation and attention part of the brain.

Also, there's a chance anti-depressants don't necessarily help just by promoting serotonin, but actually might help because promoting serotonin also promotes production of BDNF (the protein that helps neuron growth in the motivation/attention part of the brain).
 
THREADS. Very impressed with the deliveries of you users. Totally redeemed. Please continue the shares. +1 for future
 
13063638:louie.mirags said:
Did this actually make you laugh? Because it's doing nothing for me

idk, i kind of chuckled at the "plants grow in size when rap music is played, but stop paying child support."
 
Stoked on this advancement:


I love seeing medical advancements that help people have easier lives and this seems to be showing some promising results.
 
13434485:Lé.Skiing said:
Sorry for the triple post, but...

A guy from Canada has flown the longest distance on a hover board(905 ft 2 in long and roughly 15 ft high).

Check the link:http://www.iflscience.com/technology/guinness-world-record-broken-farthest-hoverboard-flight

(slash) Video:


That's fucking cool. But also terrifying - is it suspended by spinning blades (a la helicopter, quadcopter, etc)? Powerful enough to carry you through the air, powerful enough to mince you into a ground meat?
 
13007094:las. said:
Yep, probably the most exciting discovery for me considering the Breit-Wheeler theory is almost a century old and it was eventually deemed impossible to actually test it by Breit And Wheeler themselves, yet now scientists have found a revolutionary technique, albeit inefficient, that confirms their theory is in fact demonstrable, and that it really is possible to convert light to matter.

The current and main downside of this newfound method though is that it would require an IMMENSE amount of energy to create an almost disproportionately small amount of matter (e=mc2), realistically giving it no practical implications (yet). Despite that, these are still very promising findings.

The only potential use I could possibly think of would be incredibly compact energy storage, but that would only work if there was a way to convert the matter back into energy without loosing too much energy.
 
Im glad you kept this thread somewhat alive. I love coming back from time to time and see what has been posted here as I like to follow the iflscience site and read about scientific news.
 
Someone in the lab I'm in was testing a few anti cancer drugs on some lung cancer mice. A few do something, many don't. One of them however, makes tumors grow faster than the controls.

oops.
 
this week in science i didnt do my homework so i probably failed my test but i wont know until 1 month from now cuz mr.totsin is going through a divorce and just doesnt want to do any of the marking cuz he said there is no reason to live anymore
 
13538781:a_pla5tic_bag said:
Someone in the lab I'm in was testing a few anti cancer drugs on some lung cancer mice. A few do something, many don't. One of them however, makes tumors grow faster than the controls.

oops.

That's pretty cool. A lot of science is educated trial and error I guess haha.
 
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