Scientists Have 3D Bioprinted Functioning Human Brain Tissue (popsci.com) 51
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Popular Science: As detailed in the new issue of the journal Cell Stem Cell, University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers have developed a novel 3D-printing approach for creating cultures that grow and operate similar to brain tissue. While traditional 3D-printing involves layering "bio-ink" vertically like a cake, the team instead tasked their machine to print horizontally, as if playing dominoes. As New Atlas explains, researchers placed neurons grown from pluripotent stem cells (those capable of becoming multiple different cell types) within a new bio-ink gel made with fibrinogen and thrombin, biomaterials involved in blood clotting. Adding other hydrogels then helped loosen the bio-ink to solve for the 3 encountered during previous 3D-printed tissue experiments. According to Su-Chun Zhang, a research lead and UW-Madison professor of neuroscience and neurology, the resultant tissue is resilient enough to maintain its structure, but also sufficiently malleable to permit adequate levels of oxygen and nutrient intake for the neurons. "The tissue still has enough structure to hold together but it is soft enough to allow the neurons to grow into each other and start talking to each other," Zhang explains in a recent university profile.
Because of their horizontal construction, the new tissue cells formed connections not only within each layer, but across them, as well -- much like human neurons. The new structures could interact thanks to producing neurotransmitters, and even created support cell networks within the 3D-printed tissue. In these experiments, the team printed both cerebral cortex and striatum cultures. Although responsible for very different functions -- the former associated with thought, language, and voluntary movement; the latter tied to visual information -- the two 3D-printed tissues could still communicate, "in a very special and specific way," Zhang said. Researchers believe their technique isn't limited to creating just those two types of cultures, but hypothetically "pretty much any type of neurons [sic] at any time," according to Zhang. This means the 3D-printing method could eventually help study how healthy portions of the brain interact with parts affected by Alzheimers, examining cell signal pathways in Downs syndrome, as well as use tissue to test new drugs. "Our brain operates in networks," Zhang explained. "We want to print brain tissue this way because cells do not operate by themselves. They talk to each other. This is how our brain works and it has to be studied all together like this to truly understand it."
Because of their horizontal construction, the new tissue cells formed connections not only within each layer, but across them, as well -- much like human neurons. The new structures could interact thanks to producing neurotransmitters, and even created support cell networks within the 3D-printed tissue. In these experiments, the team printed both cerebral cortex and striatum cultures. Although responsible for very different functions -- the former associated with thought, language, and voluntary movement; the latter tied to visual information -- the two 3D-printed tissues could still communicate, "in a very special and specific way," Zhang said. Researchers believe their technique isn't limited to creating just those two types of cultures, but hypothetically "pretty much any type of neurons [sic] at any time," according to Zhang. This means the 3D-printing method could eventually help study how healthy portions of the brain interact with parts affected by Alzheimers, examining cell signal pathways in Downs syndrome, as well as use tissue to test new drugs. "Our brain operates in networks," Zhang explained. "We want to print brain tissue this way because cells do not operate by themselves. They talk to each other. This is how our brain works and it has to be studied all together like this to truly understand it."
Re: Damien Lee aka GreaterTroll aka rsilvergun (Score:2)
Maybe we can print orange clown a new brain! His existing one seems defective. "Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, sent 10,000 troops, Nikki Haley..."
Functioning brain tissue? (Score:3, Funny)
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So.... no chance of cloning Donald Trump anytime soon? :D
Cloning would make a *copy*. Is that what you really want? Think it through man...
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So.... no chance of cloning Donald Trump anytime soon? :D
Cloning would make a *copy*. Is that what you really want? Think it through man...
Truly thinking it through: Two Donald Trumps in a room together would not be something anyone else would want to witness, but left to their own devices they'd likely be a LOT less harmful to society than one. They'd fall into self-worship mode, ramp each other up, and never have to bother talking to anyone else for the ego-stroking they so desperately desire.
I say do it. That's science worth funding.
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Can this new tech be used to cure his MAGAs?
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So.... no chance of cloning Donald Trump anytime soon? :D
You don't need any functioning brain tissue for that. However, there is hope for him: he might finally get some working brain tissue.
And so it begins (Score:1)
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I think that unlikely - silicon will get there first and is more robust. Meat has a lot of biological needs and is vulnerable to infection and mechanical damage.
The horror will be when someone manages to grow a brain complex enough for consciousness to emerge, but it's stuck in a jar in a lab with only the sensory inputs and outputs the experimenters provide for whatever their purposes are.
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Neurons have some sort of self-assembly, able to go from about 800 MB of DNA data, to full human-level intelligence. And humans run at about 100 Watts, most of which is the body. As great as silicon is, for general intelligence it is beat by biological for now, with no indication that programmers will figure out general intelligence this decade.
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Utopia or dystopia? (Score:3)
Most technologies are morally neutral but some can be used in both really great and really horrible ways.
I do hope this is limited to medical solutions and improving our understanding of the brain and not turned into something capable of self awareness.
I doubt they can do that now but with enough research and effort, who knows?
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How will they know they're going to die?
Who is telling them? How?
What sensory input are you imagining them getting, that they can convert into knowledge of their impending deaths?
Even Russians who can see their impending death still travel to Ukraine anyway. Stupid as they are, Russians are still slightly above brain stuff grown in a dish. And nobody cares about them dying by the thousands.
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I don't think it matters if a self aware entity is made aware of its upcoming death. Simply creating and then killing (murdering?) it is enough to make me queasy.
As far as Russians go, please stop with the dehumanization. The guys going to the front are not volunteers. They're conscripts and prisoners. The war should end to save both Ukrainian and Russian life. It makes me sick to see Russian victims of Putin's stupid war and moronic military tactics sent to pointless death en masse. I get really turn
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I think there's a lot of bitterness from some corners in regards to the fact that Russians generally have done very little about their decline into autocracy under Putin as well as the general lack of protest of their war of aggression versus Ukraine. Here in the US we had people storming congress because they had been mislead into believing our last presidential election was rigged meanwhile the Russians have pretty much sat idly by while first Putin robbed them of democracy and now is sending their childr
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I'm on the same page with you on individuals vs their society as a whole. I give them a break in the sense that the Russian people have -always- lived under some form of totalitarian government allllllll the way back. The czars, the communists, and now Putin. Culturally speaking they don't have a deep concept of human rights, fighting the system, speaking out, etc, etc. and when it does happen it tends to come with great bloodshed not pamphleteering and going to the ballot box. They're not a western cou
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Well the real tragedy in this and how Russians differ from the other countries you mention is that for a moment Russians really did have a proper democracy and proper freedoms and it wasnt that long ago. Putin was first elected in what was widely perceived as an honest, properly competitive election after all.
It's an utter tragedy that the Russians couldnt keep what they had, especially when they have so many positive examples and were literally being welcomed into the Western world with even the prospect o
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Absolutely. I always thought it was horrible that Russia didn't make the leap to being a western allied nation. There was no external reason they couldn't have joined the rest of the civilized world, even if they didn't join the EU. I doubt they could have met the economic stability requirements for that but EU membership isn't a requirement to be a decent nation for your own people and your neighbors. They have tremendous natural resources and highly educated citizens. The rest was on them from there.
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You do know they had elections and all that good democracy stuff back then, right?
Once again, my sociopathic lying troll, coward was the right call for you.
Re: Who was the donor (Score:2)
Who has the broken brain? Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, 10,000 troops, Nikki Haley....
Not novel tech (Score:4, Funny)
"As New Atlas explains, researchers placed neurons grown from pluripotent stem cells (those capable of becoming multiple different cell types) within a new bio-ink gel made with fibrinogen and thrombin, biomaterials involved in blood clotting."
HP has had self-clotting ink for several years now.
Zombie food (Score:2)
This means the 3D-printing method could eventually help study how healthy portions of the brain interact with parts affected by Alzheimers, examining cell signal pathways in Downs syndrome, as well as use tissue to test new drugs.
...and zombie food. Don't forget about providing edible human brain tissue for zombies.
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The show would be called "True Brains", about zombies finally being accepted into society thanks to a technological breakthrough for feeding them...
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Hokum (Score:3)
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Well yes, to do anything useful the neurons need to be connected to each other via a complex web of dendrites, which would be a total PITA to build. So really they printed brain cells, and those cells grew their own connections. A normal brain would have the brain neurons reproducing and interconnecting over several months while receiving inputs from sensory nerves, having started from less specialized cells already in a pattern. Skipping that won't be easy.
Not enough (Score:3)
And brains feed on sensations from the environment and society, can't study the brain in isolation.
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