Today’s Popular Posts
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Popular Posts
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Tag Archives: neuron
A keystone discovery: Proteins and synaptic vesicles
It happens quite a lot in neuroscience that something can be described without really knowing why it’s doing something. Bear with me a bit, as what I’m about to describe is probably unfamiliar to most people and also very much concerns the nitty-gritty of how the cells (neurons) of the brain and nervous system work. [...]
Posted in Impact: Neuroscience Also tagged Edwards, nerve pulses, neuroscience, neurotransmitter, proteins, synapse, UCSF, v-SNARE, VAMP7, vesicle 1 Comment
Memflector: Neuron-like computer component
I try not to put too much weight on very early advances in technology. This is particularly true of computer technology because there are so many relatively new avenues of research, all clamoring for attention: Quantum computing, DNA computing, optical computing…etc. On the other hand, computing has become so vital, especially for science and business, [...]
Posted in Impact: Computer Power Also tagged brain-like, chalcogenide, computer, computer power, memflector, memristor, PCM, phase-change material, synapse Leave a comment
Neuroscience: Memory tied to a specific protein complex
At times it must seem to neuroscientists that the enigma of memory reveals its secrets to them as if they were the proverbial blind men describing an elephant. “Ah yes, it has a hose, a very thick hose, so thick it’s almost like a tree trunk!” If only it were as easy to get the [...]
Posted in Impact: Neuroscience Also tagged axon, CaMKII, memory, memory formation, neuroscience, NMDAR, protein, protein complex, synapse 1 Comment
Ephaptic coupling: Could be how brains coordinate
I love it when scientists say things like this: “I firmly believe that understanding the origin and functionality of endogenous brain fields will lead to several revelations regarding information processing at the circuit level, which, in my opinion, is the level at which percepts and concepts arise,” Anastassiou says. “This, in turn, will lead us [...]
Posted in Impact: Neuroscience Also tagged biophysics, brain, consciousness, electric field, endogenous, ephaptic coupling, neuroscience, spike field, synapse, thought 3 Comments
Optogenetics: Controlling live neurons with light
“We can activate or inactivate individual neurons or muscle cells, essentially turning the worm into a virtual biorobot.” Dr. Aravinthan D. T. Samuel, professor of physics at Harvard Center for Brain Science (Massachusetts, USA) is talking about optogenetics, one of the newest fields in science. The pioneer work was done around 2002. The name, optogenetics, [...]
Posted in News: Neuroscience Also tagged biorobot, C. elegans, genetic modification, genetics, GM, laser, optical control, optics, optogenetics, photonics Leave a comment
Cracking the neural code: Not yet, but models help
What neuroscience researchers really, really want is to figure out the neural (brain) code. What are all those neurons saying to each other? That’s an analogy, of course. There are many analogies that can be used to describe the brain. For the moment, let’s use a big tangled ball of thread. The neurons, brain cells, [...]
Posted in News: Neuroscience Also tagged cerebral cortex, computer model, neural code, neuroscience, spikes, spiny stellate cells, synapses, thalamus Leave a comment
Neural stem cells: Going back to a brain with more plasticity
Of mice and men: If it works in mice it (might) work in people. So the thinking goes when scientists do brain research with mice. Only, as a rule, the scientists would say it’s possible that something they observe in mice might also be observed in human beings (they usually hope so), but there is [...]
Posted in News: Stem Cells Also tagged MGE, neural stem cells, neuroscience, ocular dominance plasticity, plasticity, stem cells, visual cortex 1 Comment
New links in neuron impulse generation
Neurons in the brain have complicated electrical systems. In fact, a study by the University of Calgary Hotchkiss Brain Institute, Faculty of Medicine (Canada) has cleared up an important misconception about the way neurons generate signals. Ion channels are used by cells to manage the (minute) difference in electrical charge between the inside and the [...]
Posted in News: Neuroscience Also tagged A-type, cerebellum, electrochemical gradient, ion channels, neuroscience, synapse, T-type Leave a comment
Update: fMRI reveals conscious activity in vegetative brains
Scanning brains for medical reasons is commonplace. “Dr. House” does it, all the time. However, scanning brains for communications…that may be something else. What else? SciTechStory covered the news of a European study, in which one patient in a vegetative state (clinically unconscious) communicated with the research team by thinking of specific activities, which were [...]
Epigenetics in the brain: Evidence of methylation beyond cell division