Nerve Cells Successfully Grown on Silicon 284
crabpeople writes "Researchers at the University of Calgary have found that nerve cells grown on a microchip can learn and memorize information which can be communicated to the brain. 'We discovered that when we used the chip to stimulate the neurons, their synaptic strength was enhanced,' said Naweed Syed, a neurobiologist at the University of Calgary's faculty of medicine."
...finally... it all makes sense (Score:2, Funny)
Sirius Cybernetics Corporation (Score:4, Funny)
Re:...finally... it all makes sense (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087622/ [imdb.com]
Kinda cool (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Kinda cool (Score:5, Interesting)
Who knows, in a few decades we might have people deleting their childhood to store and smuggle hundreds of GB of information about the cure for a major epidemic that an evil pharmaceutical company is exploiting for profit.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Kinda cool (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Kinda cool (Score:2)
I'm not even gonna give the title, that would just be blowing it out of the water.
Kinda funny though, I saw Henry Rollins in concert last night, and spoke to him before the show about his role in that movie. "You *liked* that role?" .. "Um, yeah Henry, I did"
Cool...
Although, and I hate to say it, but is he starting to look more like Richard Dean Anderson as time goes by? Pic from last night [shadowsrealm.com] and yes, I look like a goof, you don't need to remind
Re:Kinda cool (Score:4, Interesting)
People get divorced and lose their families and free time due to the high demands of the current marketplace.
People needing to do more work each day take pills to reduce the need for sleep.
Employers needing to cut training costs develop the "Plug N Work" chip. When you get hired you are assigned a read only chip that has all of the companies policies, procedures, employee names, and specific work duties for each task.
Employers add wireless to the PNW chip to rapidly update corporate policies as they are implemented.
The tasks and skills for your job (doctor, lawyer, tech support, etc) are duplicated by a firm that sells the chips to your company. Your wage just became minimum because now ANYONE can walk off the street and perform the function.
Wireless communication reaches the brain level and we go from being worker drones to Borg drones. This eliminates the internal need for teleconferencing, e-mail, telephones, or bulletin boards. Your pr0n and Slashdot time at work become obsolete in the new order as everyone would know what you were doing.
Underground hackers develop technology to override The Companies' chip and deliver slashdot, goatse.cs, and pr0n unbidden to all recievers in the area.
George Orwells dream of the though police and ultimate revisionism become a reality.
But perhaps I'm just being paranoid.
Re:Kinda cool (Score:2)
Minimum wage? No, you're not thinking this through. This is a true commodification of labour. The entire economy will have to change to accomodate this idea... and it will be fantastic! This is something that Yevgeny Zamyatin would've loved to include in his utopic novel We.
P.S. I'm serious: We is so
Re:Kinda cool (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Kinda cool (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, I find mine useful anyways, I am sure some people have mized results
Re:Kinda cool: Neurons vs. Transistors (Score:5, Informative)
A neuron is much more than a transistor-like switch. On the one side of the neuron's central body is a set of dendrites that connect to and gather input from other neurons. The average neuron might have a thousand of these dendrites.
The synapse at the end of each dendrite acts like part of a multiply-accumulate term -- taking the signal from an other neuron, multiplying it by a numerical coefficient and summing it into the total excitation level of the neuron's body. I suspect that the precision of this multiply -accumulate process is fairly low -- perhaps 8 to 16 bits.
Next, the body of the neuron has a long axon extending from it that sends the output of the neuron to other neurons (connecting to the dendrites of other neurons). This axon can be quite long, millimeters, even inches, in length. Thus, the axon is like an off-chip line driver with the potential to have a very high fanout (of a 1000 or more). (On a modern microchip, these off-chip connections are driven by much larger transistors than the small 65 nm ones used in computation).
Third, a neuron is not a static multiply-accumulate system. The coefficients on each synapse change in response to long-term adaptive processes. This process is computationally complex and includes cross-correlation of inputs between synapses and processing of other chemical signals in the brain. Cross-correlation alone could require the equivalent of several kilobytes to several megabyts of RAM. (We won't even get into the adaptive processes that include physical growth and removal of dendrites as this has no easy analog in hardware)
In summary, a neuron is more than a transistor-like switch. Its a free-running 1000 register multiply-accumulator with an off-chip line driver and a statistical processing engine that updates the coefficients on each of the multiply-accumulate terms. Thus, emulating a single neuron would require hundreds of thouands to millions of transistors.
Re:Kinda cool: Neurons vs. Transistors (Score:4, Interesting)
But it clearly would be folly to try to emulate a neuron using purely digital computing techniques. You're dealing with an analog mechanism that is pretty much a wire-or of many inputs feeding into a capacitor. This is very much an analog computing circuit; now the question is how efficiently you can do A/D-D/A conversion on this scale.
(And as I recall, the sciatic nerve running down your leg is a single cell with an axon over 1 foot long. Definitely some impressive stuff Mother Nature has concocted...)
Software version (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Software version (more than Boolean) (Score:5, Informative)
Excellent point. You are right about the computational flexibility of neurons. They can represent a wide range of logical functions, although I believe that the single neuron is incapable of doing an XOR.
But a neuron is more that a Boolean circuit. Although a neuron seems like a two-state device (its either quiesent or its firing), it is more of an N-state analog device in which the pulse-rate encodes a numerical quantity (probably the equivalent of an 8 to 16 bit floating point number). That is why the dendrite field is like a giant numerical multiply-accumulate.
Re:Software version (more than Boolean) (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, I think it can be done (or at least a partially working XOR.) Imagine a neuron with two inputs and an output. But these inputs are not both excitatory: one is excitatory and the other is inhibitory. So, input only from the excitatory branch produces an action potential, and input from both bra
Temporal Synchrony (Score:3, Informative)
You're right on-- the change in firing rate relative to the baseline firing rate is very important. Also, there is some reason to think (logica [ucla.edu]
Re:Software version (more than Boolean) (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Kinda cool: Neurons vs. Transistors (Score:5, Informative)
This axon can be quite long, millimeters, even inches, in length.
Acutally, it can be over a meter in length (spinal cord to calf is one axone). Try that with a transistor
Re:Kinda cool: Neurons vs. Transistors (Score:2, Interesting)
I've always figured that the best design for a computer would be one that's able to "imagine". Since it would take too many transistors to emulate a neuron, maybe there's some other way to do it? Is binary the only way to compute?
Its the start!!! (Score:2, Funny)
You'll be the reason of extinction!!!
Re:Its the start!!! (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Its the start!!! (Score:2)
Just like sci-fi. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Just like sci-fi. (Score:3, Funny)
I didn't know Asimov wrote THOSE kinds of books
Re:Just like sci-fi. (Score:2)
I'm no Bill Joy (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a song that says, "It only takes a spark to get a fire going". So too is it true that it only takes a couple neurons to start synapsing. As these true neural webs become more complicated, it would be interesting to see if any kind of emergent behavior was evident.
Also, with the current political and scientific climate as it is, this could be the first step to replicating a nervous system without having to rely on fetuses for stem cells. It requires no human cloning and holds immense promise.
It would definitely be cool to have a couple of these chips implanted to enhance the base memory that we are kitted with at birth, that's for sure!
Re:I'm no Bill Joy (Score:5, Insightful)
No it's not. This involves interfacing with the neurons that are already there.
As these true neural webs become more complicated, it would be interesting to see if any kind of emergent behavior was evident
Given that large collections of neurons are well known to exhibit emergent behaviour, I think it would be more interesting if they didn't.
this could be the first step to replicating a nervous system without having to rely on fetuses for stem cells. It requires no human cloning and holds immense promise
Nerve cells harvested from an animal brain can be grown in the lab. There is no need for embryonic stem cells or cloning at all. Growing them on silicon does not make this easier - in fact they will probably grown better in a petri dish.
It would definitely be cool to have a couple of these chips implanted to enhance the base memory that we are kitted with at birth
Memory in the brain is not simple storage of information. It is unlikely that pluggin a DRAM into your brain would be able to enhance your memory.
It's not about getting more memory (Score:3, Interesting)
Input interface? (Score:3, Interesting)
Kind of like how people in "that movie" can learn how to fly a UH-1 in 3 seconds.
Now THAT ability would be cool.
Re:I'm no Bill Joy (Score:2)
I am waiting for the Alastair Reynolds [powells.com]-style Conjoiner conversion myself, but Johnny Mnemonic will do in the meantime.
As long as it's the short story and not the film, that is.
Re:I'm no Bill Joy (Score:3, Informative)
Bothe, Samii, Eckmiller, Neurobionics - An Interdisciplinary Approach to Substitute Impaired Functions of the Human Nervous System, Amsterdam : Elsevier, 1993.
questions, questions (Score:3, Interesting)
I think it would be interesting to understand how a neural interface would 'feel'. What would a process based in ones and zeros feel like? How would the brain adapt to take advantage of the new processing capability? Would we be able to project our consciousness outsi
Hasn't this been done before? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Hasn't this been done before? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Hasn't this been done before? (Score:5, Interesting)
The hype surrounding this was insane mostly due to fact that everyone thought this was the true start to cybernetics. In the end, the hype died down, My dad's lab got a ton of grants and he got back to doing more research. Ironically enough, the most publicisied research that he did (the neuron on a chip) probably had the least impact.
Such is the world of science at times
So, yes, it's nothing new. Just repackaged.
Re:Hasn't this been done before? (Score:2)
Re:Hasn't this been done before? (Score:5, Informative)
This particular chip has no electrodes. The grillwork design allows the neurons to grow, and contains them indefinitely. We are currently building full chips with this design, and with electrodes.
Keep an eye out for this page. Once we get fully functional chips, it shouldn't be long before I can show some real experiments and data.
I think the big news is that electrodes were on the silicon chip, and were actually able to "learn and memorize information which can be communicated to the brain" (as per the original article).
Also, the page looks like it hasn't been updated since 1995. I wonder what happened to this project. From the page Maher and Thorne seemed so close to what has just been acheived in Canada.
Re:Hasn't this been done before? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Hasn't this been done before? (Score:3, Informative)
human computers or cybronic humans ? (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe it's time to admit that nature does a better job bruteforcing (OK , what else do you call SEX and EVOLUTION) the secrets of this world than all our mathematical precision.. (E=MC2
Re:human computers or cybronic humans ? (Score:2, Informative)
OT: evolution vs. bruteforcing vs. creation (Score:4, Insightful)
On the other hand you are right: This trial and error seems to lead to better results in the long run compared to deterministic creation. But this scheme is already adopted by science. IIRC there was a distributed computing project simulating a robot with a defined task and changing the parameters of the robot. The different clients exchanged the information about the results. I don't remember anymore the name or the homepage of the project, I think it was already 4 or 5 years ago...
Re:OT: evolution vs. bruteforcing vs. creation (Score:2)
Umm, no.
In evolutionary terms, 'fittest' are those who survive. There is no objective definition of 'fittest' independent of survival.
Re:OT: evolution vs. bruteforcing vs. creation (Score:2, Interesting)
But from a logic point of view: If a generation with severel individuals, each of them with minor changes compared to it's ancestors, is born, for some individuals their changes will be an advantage, for some the changes are a disadvantage.
The weaker individuals will not spontanously die, but they might have fewer chidren or maybe only few of their children will survive. The stronger individuals will have more children, or if they have th
Re:OT: evolution vs. bruteforcing vs. creation (Score:2)
Re:OT: evolution vs. bruteforcing vs. creation (Score:2)
It's tempting for us, as humans, to believe that we represent the peak of evolutionary fitness. We don't; no organism does, because fitness isn't static. What traits are usefu
Humans deserves more credits (Score:2, Interesting)
Modern science is a 400 - 500 years old thing. Nature had billion of year to reach the levels we see.
I think that the progresses we are achieving in the last 50 years are *really* impressive, and probably what we'll see in the next 50 years will be even more impressing. Sometimes humans deserves more credits IMHO.
Other uses? (Score:5, Interesting)
If only they could find out how did the strength increase and wether we can do the same to the human body we can find a cure for most of the nervous system degradation diseases. Anybody have link to a more verbose article?
Re:Other uses? (Score:2, Informative)
[aip.org]
link to article published in Physical Review Letters
PubMed link to academic ref (Score:3, Informative)
this isn't a novel effect (Score:3, Interesting)
FYI, LTP is one of the most promising mechanisms proposed for explaining how long term memory works.
Re:Other uses? (Score:2)
The Future of Computing (Score:5, Insightful)
Not making faster Pentiums or Athlons. Sorry. Most of that magic has already been woven. Who out there is qualified to make systems level designs and decisions about bio computer systems? Think about the type of knowledge it must take about physics, electrical and computer engineering, as well as biological knowledge.
What type of magnetic and power restrictions will there be? Reliability? What type of optimizations will exist? Interfaces? Flexibility?
We're still quite far away from having things like this be applicable to modern day but think about when you too can say, "I know Kung Fu"!
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:5, Interesting)
The difference here is that our brains use the 3rd dimension effectively (and also work in parallel, I think). Now I'm not sure if the latest breakthrough uses electro-chemical processes to communicate, but if it's faster than 200MHz, it definitely has huge potential.
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:2)
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:4, Insightful)
Unless we use equivalent mechanisms for cpu based computing comparing the speed of the brain to silcon based units imho doesnt make much sense.
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually the idea of "reflexes" is the same as electro-robots which can since objects by electrical load. That hot plate is nothing more than an over threshold input that cause electro-motor response. An electrical circuit could also be easily designed to include a little bit of fussy logic via a simple anolog circuit to achive the same thing.
So, equivalent mechanisms are not readily available for cpu based computing, but there are for ANN based computing. If we ever hope to match the basic capabilities of animals we can not just rely on cpu based computing, we also need ANN based computing for sensor preprocessing and feed back controlled motor function
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:5, Informative)
The precise properties of individual Neurons are unpredictable and highly variable. Worse, they require constant life support just to stay alive. A 5 minute power interruption to your neural CPU and it's time to go shopping for a new one. You would certainly not want to build a practical computing tool out of them.
Neural computing will remain the domain of highly specialized research into AI and neural computing forever. We may develop neural analogs using nanotech or some other gee-whiz tech, but they will not be true neurons.
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:5, Insightful)
Neural computing will remain the domain of highly specialized research into AI and neural computing forever. We may develop neural analogs using nanotech or some other gee-whiz tech, but they will not be true neurons.
I disagree, I think neural computing will have practical applications, but more in the lines of neural interfaces than actual computers. Imagine a prosthetic(sp?) arm that works just like the old one did...
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:2)
But that's a far cry from being the future of computing, which implies that we'll use biological neural tissue instead of fabricated CPU's.
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:2)
Re:The Future of Computing (Score:2)
Huge market? (Score:4, Funny)
The researches have read some Slashdot posts, and believe that there must be a huge market for this chip. There is clearly a need for it ;-)
Magical Transistor (Score:2, Funny)
I'd like to see this transistor...
fud
I could use a .. (Score:3, Funny)
It would also be cool with an encyclopedia or even a few o'reilly books implanted.
Too bad it seems to be a one-way communication only, otherwise a spellchecker implant would be cool too
"Communicated to the brain?" (Score:5, Insightful)
While the article mentions this in the introduction, it doesn't mention this happening at all in the research. It talks about neurons communicating with each other. This is a long way from connecting this chip into a living brain in an animal that can still function.
While I agree that this is a fascinating article, we should make sure not to sensationalize it too much. Making chips that interface with actual brains in actual animals, even if they are snails, is still a long way off.
Re:"Communicated to the brain?" (Score:3, Interesting)
No it's not [duke.edu]
Catching a virus (Score:3, Funny)
very cool... (Score:4, Funny)
Skynet (Score:2, Funny)
da da dum de dum.
da da dum de dum.
Termihuman III, coming to a cinema near you.
In the year 2250, a small pocket resistance of humans find the means to develop an organic gooker. Using the power of jelly to disable our circuit boards, they start a highly accurate military campaign to overrun the machines...
Tron and Tran, are a simple couple thrown together in this all-action, pistol pumping, explosion-full chase between man and machine. Will their love be enough to conquer the invading h
The brain is a muscle (Score:2)
Makes sense, doesn't it?
The (possibly) frightening spect of this is that it may pave the way for artificial lifeforms/cyborgs/skynet...
In other news (Score:4, Funny)
Anyone read "Interface" by Stephen Bury? (Score:5, Interesting)
Chip embedded in politician's brain after a stroke - he goes on to be president.... v. spooky.
I would love to see alzheimer's patients helped with this. If it's a genetic disease, I'm up the creek and dropped me paddle a while back.
- Lnr
This could really upset international politics (Score:5, Funny)
Re:This could really upset international politics (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This could really upset international politics (Score:2, Interesting)
Another great steps (Score:3, Funny)
Half-bit bandwidth (Score:5, Insightful)
scientists stimulated one nerve cell to communicate with a second cell which transmitted that signal to multiple cells within the network.
Singal up (probably down too, though that is not said). That's a start. Now let me jump.
Imagine how this would feel in your own brain. Even strengthened to noticeable level by a lump of neurons, the signal would still read "beep". Now imagine being fed information through that channel. "Beep, bip beep bip bip beep". Better start training that morse.
Now let's enhance the input by adding more bits into it and running data through a digital-to-analog converter. This is where you would slowly be able to "see colors", one at a time. Low signal, cold feeling; high signal, hot feeling. That is brainable information. You can associate different patterns of these "colors" to different ideas.
But still it's not like you could see any shapes, is it?
Now add more bytes, feed them in side-by-side. That's a feed. At this point, feel nausea. Something is feeding noise into your thoughts, something you cannot possibly comprehend.
Would take a processing system not unlike vision inside the brain to translate that feed into experiences like colors, tastes, touches, then further associate these to make shapes out of the noise.
A long way.
Worth taking, of course, as research goes, but I wouldn't toss away those external displays as of yet. Have a hunch computers won't be the same, either, when we get there.
Future research will focus on interfacing silicon chips with the human brain to control artificial limbs and develop "thinking" computers.
Mostly fun!
Re:Half-bit bandwidth (Score:4, Insightful)
Imagine trying to describe vision to someone who's been blind from birth. It's nigh-on impossible to explain, as it's unlike anything else they can experience. This is what we're seeing here - a new sense we just can't comprehend, yet could offer us such incredible benefits we can't hope to fully understand at such an early stage as this.
Re:Half-bit bandwidth (Score:2)
This new tech is basically a way of doing it more efficiently.
Re:Half-bit bandwidth (Score:2)
Now - feed simple messages such as 'food' or 'your mum' or 'barney' into this interface to train it to associate the feed with whats going on around it.
You never know - your brain may well start treating this as a new sense - and you would potentially have some mor
in other news (Score:2)
When pressed further, the spokesman stated that he couldn't be sure, but believed that growing neurons on AMD chips would however not contravene any laws.
RIAA executives were unavailable for comment, but an anonymous source indicated that at least one executive has been ad
to paraphrase Alan Cooper (Score:5, Insightful)
Q: What do you get when you cross a camera and a computer?
A: A computer.
His point is that from an interface and place-in-the-world point of view, most products that have been digitally enhanced tend to remain closer to their technology roots than their analog counterparts (with all of the usability, and I would say ethical, challenges inherient in a technologist-driven system).
That said, this is pretty frickin' cool, but the double-edged sword presented by this innovation seems both particularly sharp and far reaching. I really hope we get this one right.
"Why can't you use your powers for Good?"
Re:to paraphrase Alan Cooper (Score:3, Insightful)
Q: What do you get when you cross a camera and a computer?
A: A computer.
Perhaps I'm missing the point (I've never read the afformentioned book), but when I cross a camera and a computer, I usually get a camera. Digital cameras are exactly this, no? The question seems a silly one. When we started making bridges out of steel did they somehow become something other than bridges?
A camera is a thing that can capture pictures and later reproduce them. You can use film, or silicon to do that, but it's a c
Reminds me of... (Score:4, Interesting)
"The danger from computers is not that they will eventually get as smart as men, but we will meanwhile agree to meet them halfway." -Bernard Avishai
Solution for tinnitus sufferers? (Score:4, Interesting)
Tinnitus is a serious problem to a lot of people today, and it can have many causes, from various diseases/illnesses, to noise damage. It apparently has to do with the nerves in one's ear, so would this kind of research, might we finally see a way to actually treat tinnitus?
Until you get T, you don't realize how lucky people who can actually be in a quiet room without going mad are...
implants (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:implants (Score:2)
Of course it opens a new filed for hacker attacks. But it won't stop us to have anyway, eventually. Certainly they will work in area of brain firewalling.
At first time as a simple solution I could use my personal laptop as a gateway connecting me to to the rest of the wor
My computer already has a mind of it's own... (Score:3, Funny)
I wonder (Score:5, Funny)
Predicted 1945(!) (Score:3, Interesting)
In the outside world, all forms of intelligence whether of sound or sight, have been reduced to the form of varying currents in an electric circuit in order that they may be transmitted. Inside the human frame exactly the same sort of process occurs. Must we always transform to mechanical movements in order to proceed from one electrical phenomenon to another?
I don't know about you.. (Score:2)
but where's the RFID? (Score:5, Funny)
Rejoice ... or not. (Score:2)
big deal (Score:4, Insightful)
The computational power of neurons comes from the way they work in groups, not the way they work alone. Therefore, it's strongly dependent upon the detailed organization of their connectivity. Grinding up a piece of brain and regrowing it on a dish will obviously not retain native connectivity. Additionally, the time it would take to manually rewire an interesting circuit by giving little localized electrical pulses (or do anything else interesting) is longer than neurons are viable in culture, and that's not a problem that's been solved yet.
I'm not saying this technology won't have important uses as a research tool, just that it won't be useful for what people here seem to think it will be useful for (high-density pornography storage). BTW, one of the more interesting characters in this field is Steve Potter [gatech.edu], a somewhat strange guy who does some technically impressive work [uwa.edu.au]
Wow that a bold future (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I call dibs on implants (Score:2)
Re:yes i am paranoid. (Score:3, Interesting)