Tag Archives: brain

A trial conducted by the University of Minnesota Medical School jointly with the Massachusetts General Hospital has shown that electrical stimulation of the brain controlled by an application that is able to learn the effects of the stimulation can lead to measurable improvement in cognitive capability. The trial involved 12 …

At the turn of the century (2006) IBM launched a project to map the human brain as a starting point to create a “cognitive computer”. It was clear from the beginning that it was an impossible dream, yet the hope was that pursuing it would increase our knowledge of the computational structures …

Just after yesterday’s post I was pointed to a NYT article discussing the possible limits of our brain in terms of storage and processing (that would be computer geek parlance, in lay terms: its limits in remembering and understanding) and of ways to overcome those limits. The article is titled …

When computer started to become part of our imagination, some 60-70 years ago, people called them “electronic brains” and the next step was to associate the transistor to the neurone. Physiologists told that a neurone works like a switch, upon reception of signals got excited and the “fired” stimulating other …

For several decades discussion has raged on the possibility to create intelligence by “duplicating” the brain. Proponents of this possibility assert that the connectivity structure of the brain results in an emergence of intelligence, hence if we were able to “copy” this connectivity we could create an “intelligent” machine. Out …

The discovery of the DNA first and the sequencing of the human genome have created huge expectation for a future where it would be possible to radically cure/stop genetic diseases (and there are over 6,000 genetic disorders already identified). Clearly the first step is to understand what might be wrong …

New Realities As technology progresses the world of bits and the world of atoms fade into a single reality. However, this reality will be dependent on the mediation devices that will be used, both hardware and software devices. The rooting of reality into the devices used to capture it is …

A new technology, sono-optogenetics, is being experimented to support brain-computer interfaces -BCI. BCI aims at capturing the brain activity, convert it into bits and provide these bits to a computer for analysing what is going on, eventually what you are thinking.  Let’s clarify that we are still very – very …

An Aston University led consortium has won a funding of 3.5 M€ from the European Commission to explore the possibility of using natural neurones (and neurones networks) in conjunction with silicon chips to improve computation resulting in artificial intelligence. Now, this goal is not just ambitious, it is in the …

17. Brain Computer Interfaces The connection of our brain to a computer was in a way imprinted in the name that many gave to the earlier ideas of computers: “Electronic Brains”. If they are both “brains” it makes sense to look for a connection among them: easier said than done. …