Tag Archives: BRAIN

Watch 3-D Movie of your Own mind with a Camera Developed By Researchers

Toronto Western Hospital

Image by .gabriel via Flickr

A team of doctors have written software that creates dynamic, real-time, three-dimensional colour movies of the brain.

“We usually think of cameras as looking out at the world. This is a new kind of camera. It gives you a window on your mind,” the Globe and Mail quoted Mark Doidge, from Toronto, as saying.

Dr. Mark Doidge, left, is in the process of attempting to map the human brain. Mechanical engineering student Art de Guzman, who is working for Doidge, wears a cap connected to 32 leads which measures surface voltage related to electrical brain activity during a demonstration at Doidge's Toronto iffice on January 27 2011. - Dr. Mark Doidge, left, is in the process of attempting to map the human brain. Mechanical engineering student Art de Guzman, who is working for Doidge, wears a cap connected to 32 leads which measures surface voltage related to electrical brain activity during a demonstration at Doidge's Toronto iffice on January 27 2011. | Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail

The “camera” adapts an algorithm known as eLORETA, amplifies EEG signals from 32 electrodes attached to the cerebral cortex, and converts them into colour-coded movies of neuronal activity.

New Technique to map Long Distance Nerve Connections in Brain

Olfactory bulb

Image via Wikipedia

Mice know fear. And they know to fear the scent of a predator. But how do their brains quickly figure out with a sniff that a cat is nearby?

It’s a complex process that starts with the scent being picked up by specific receptors in their noses. But until now it wasn’t clear exactly how these scent signals proceeded from nose to noggin for neural processing.

Activity of Brain Nerve cells influenced by Magnetic Stimulation enables more learning ability

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)
Image via Wikipedia

What sounds like science fiction is actually possible: thanks to magnetic stimulation, the activity of certain brain nerve cells can be deliberately influenced. What happens in the brain in this context has been unclear up to now. Medical experts from Bochum under the leadership of Prof. Dr. Klaus Funke (Department of Neurophysiology) have now shown that various stimulus patterns changed the activity of distinct neuronal cell types. In addition, certain stimulus patterns led to rats learning more easily. The knowledge obtained could contribute to cerebral stimulation being used more purposefully in future to treat functional disorders of the brain. The researchers have published their studies in the Journal of Neuroscience and in the European Journal of Neuroscience.

LEARN ANATOMY OF BRAIN IN A NEW & ADVANCED WAY

BrainVoyager Brain Tutor

The BrainVoyager product family ranges from professional fMRI imaging tools, to at-home and on-the-go brain anatomy tutors. I’ve actually had the award-winning Brain Tutor application since I took a class in which I had to dissect a sheep brain. It helped me review the different areas of the brain and their functions when I wasn’t in the lab.

Brain Tutor 3D for iPhone/iPad

Brain Tutor 3D for iPhone/iPad

Brain Tutor HD for iPad

Brain Tutor HD for iPad

More recently, BrainVoyager has developed iPhone/iPad Apps you can use on the go. There’s a free iPhone/iPad version, and a more robust iPad-only version for $1.99. Both let you explore the structure and function of the human brain from the palm of your hand.

NEW 3-D IMAGING MICROSCOPE TO RECORD NEURONAL ACTIVITY

To understand the root of the problem of these latter diseases, visualizing brain activity is key. But even the best imaging devices available — fMRIs and PET scans — can only give a “coarse” picture of brain activity.

UCLA neuroscientists have now collaborated with physicists to develop a non-invasive, ultra–high-speed microscope that can record in real time the firing of thousands of individual neurons in the brain as they communicate, or miscommunicate, with each other.

“In our view, this is the world’s fastest two-photon excitation microscope for three-dimensional imaging in vivo,” said UCLA physics professor Katsushi Arisaka, who designed the new optical imaging system with UCLA assistant professor of neurology and neurobiology Dr. Carlos Portera-Cailliau and colleagues.

NOW RETINAL PROSTHESIS IS ACTIVATED BY LIGHT

n a mere half-decade, the use of light to stimulate the brain has moved from basic science to the frontiers of bioengineering. By inserting into brain cells a light-sensitive protein originally found in swamp algae, engineers and scientists have begun to manipulate neurons with a dexterity that could soon vastly outstrip the capabilities of today’s electrical brain stimulation methods. This month, Patrick Degenaar reported early progress toward a non-invasive prosthetic retina that uses light to force retinal ganglion cells to fire on command, presented at the IEEE Biomedical Circuits and Systems conference.