Tuesday, January 29, 2008
State of the STFU
Friday, January 25, 2008
Super-Mega-Massive Super Paper Friday
(btw-my rice cooker is friggin fantastic! Seriously the best rice I've ever had. Score 1 for science!)
Motor learning: passing a skill from one hand to the other.
Birbaumer N.
Curr Biol. 2007 Dec 4;17(23):R1024-6.
Pioneers of Cortical Plasticity: six classic papers by Wiesel and Hubel.
Constantine-Paton M.
J Neurophysiol. 2008 Jan 23 [Epub ahead of print]
Neuronal activity in the cingulate motor areas during adaptation to a new dynamic environment.
Richardson AG, Lassi-Tucci G, Padoa-Schioppa C, Bizzi E.
J Neurophysiol. 2008 Jan 23 [Epub ahead of print]
Reading and controlling human brain activation using real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging.
deCharms RC.
Trends Cogn Sci. 2007 Nov;11(11):473-81. Epub 2007 Nov 7.
On the programming and reprogramming of actions.
Mars RB, Piekema C, Coles MG, Hulstijn W, Toni I.
Cereb Cortex. 2007 Dec;17(12):2972-9. Epub 2007 Mar 26.
Hand Movement Direction Decoded from MEG and EEG
Stephan Waldert, Hubert Preissl, Evariste Demandt, Christoph Braun, Niels Birbaumer, Ad Aertsen, and Carsten Mehring
The Journal of Neuroscience, January 23, 2008, 28(4):1000-1008.
Modulation of Muscle Synergy Recruitment in Primate Grasping
Simon A. Overduin,1 Andrea d'Avella,2 Jinsook Roh,1 and Emilio Bizzi
The Journal of Neuroscience, January 23, 2008, 28(4):880-892.
Optimality, stochasticity, and variability in motor behavior.
Guigon E, Baraduc P, Desmurget M.
J Comput Neurosci. 2008 Feb;24(1):57-68. Epub 2007 May 22.
Regulation of spike timing in visual cortical circuits.
Tiesinga P, Fellous JM, Sejnowski TJ.
Nat Rev Neurosci. 2008 Feb;9(2):97-107.
Muscle synergies during locomotion in the cat: a model for motor cortex control.
Drew T, Kalaska J, Krouchev N.
J Physiol. 2008 Jan 17 [Epub ahead of print]
Neural coding: The power of one
Katherine Whalley
Nature Reviews Neuroscience 9, 78 (2008).
Restoring connections
Leonie Welberg
Nature Reviews Neuroscience 9, 80 (2008).
Regulation of spike timing in visual cortical circuits
Paul Tiesinga, Jean-Marc Fellous & Terrence J. Sejnowski
Nature Reviews Neuroscience 9, 97-107 (February 2008).
Interpreting fMRI data: maps, modules and dimensions
Hans P. Op de Beeck, Johannes Haushofer & Nancy G. Kanwisher
Nature Reviews Neuroscience 9, 123-135 (February 2008).
Molecular and electrophysiological evidence for net synaptic potentiation in wake and depression in sleep.
Vyazovskiy VV, Cirelli C, Pfister-Genskow M, Faraguna U, Tononi G.
Nat Neurosci. 2008 Jan 20 [Epub ahead of print]
Order-dependent modulation of directional signals in the supplementary and presupplementary motor areas.
Sohn JW, Lee D.
J Neurosci. 2007 Dec 12;27(50):13655-66.
Evidence for a distributed hierarchy of action representation in the brain.
Grafton ST, Hamilton AF.
Hum Mov Sci. 2007 Aug;26(4):590-616. Epub 2007 Aug 13.
Multisensory interplay reveals crossmodal influences on 'sensory-specific' brain regions, neural responses, and judgments.
Driver J, Noesselt T.
Neuron. 2008 Jan 10;57(1):11-23.
Altered cortical activation during a motor task in ALS. Evidence for involvement of central pathways.
Stanton BR, Williams VC, Leigh PN, Williams SC, Blain CR, Jarosz JM, Simmons A.
J Neurol. 2007 Sep;254(9):1260-7. Epub 2007 Mar 25.
Inconvenient truths about neural processing in primary motor cortex.
Scott SH.
J Physiol. 2008 Jan 10 [Epub ahead of print]
Deterministic Neural Classification
Kar-Ann Toh
Neural Computation 0:0, 1-31
A New Multineuron Spike Train Metric
Conor Houghton, Kamal Sen
Neural Computation 0:0, 1-17
Integrating motion and depth via parallel pathways.
Ponce CR, Lomber SG, Born RT.
Nat Neurosci. 2008 Jan 13 [Epub ahead of print]
Reactivation of experience-dependent cell assembly patterns in the hippocampus.
O'Neill J, Senior TJ, Allen K, Huxter JR, Csicsvari J.
Nat Neurosci. 2008 Jan 13 [Epub ahead of print]
Intrinsic Mechanisms for Adaptive Gain Rescaling in Barrel Cortex
Marta Díaz-Quesada, and Miguel Maravall
J. Neurosci. 28: 696-710
Brain–computer symbiosis
Gerwin Schalk
2008 J. Neural Eng. 5 P1-P15
Neural mechanisms for learning actions in context.
Luu P, Tucker DM, Stripling R.
Brain Res. 2007 Nov 7;1179:89-105. Epub 2007 Jun 5.
Brain-computer communication: motivation, aim, and impact of exploring a virtual apartment.
Leeb R, Lee F, Keinrath C, Scherer R, Bischof H, Pfurtscheller G.
IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng. 2007 Dec;15(4):473-82.
Recruitment and comfort of BION implanted electrical stimulation: implications for FES applications.
Popovic D, Baker LL, Loeb GE.
IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng. 2007 Dec;15(4):577-86.
Targeting Axon Growth from Neuronal Transplants along Preformed Guidance Pathways in the Adult CNS
Kristine S. Ziemba, Nagarathnamma Chaudhry, Alexander G. Rabchevsky, Ying Jin, and George M. Smith
J. Neurosci. 28: 340-348
Human Pavlovian–Instrumental Transfer
Deborah Talmi, Ben Seymour, Peter Dayan, and Raymond J. Dolan
J. Neurosci. 28: 360-368
A Maximum Entropy Model Applied to Spatial and Temporal Correlations from Cortical Networks In Vitro
Aonan Tang, David Jackson, Jon Hobbs, Wei Chen, Jodi L. Smith, Hema Patel, Anita Prieto, Dumitru Petrusca, Matthew I. Grivich, Alexander Sher, Pawel Hottowy, Wladyslaw Dabrowski, Alan M. Litke, and John M. Beggs
J. Neurosci. 28: 505-518
General-purpose filter design for neural prosthetic devices.
Srinivasan L, Eden UT, Mitter SK, Brown EN.
J Neurophysiol. 2007 Oct;98(4):2456-75. Epub 2007 May 23.
Posterior parietal cortex encodes autonomously selected motor plans.
Cui H, Andersen RA.
Neuron. 2007 Nov 8;56(3):552-9.
Spike-timing in primary sensory neurons: a model of somatosensory transduction in the rat
Ben Mitchinson, Ehsan Arabzadeh, Mathew E. Diamond, Tony J. Prescott
Biological Cybernetics. January 08, 2008.
Predictive feedback control and Fitts’ law
Peter Gawthrop, Martin Lakie and Ian Loram
January 08, 2008
(This odd little journal requires registration, but is free. Weird.)
Mirror neurons and motor intentionality.
Rizzolatti G, Sinigaglia C.
Funct Neurol. 2007 Oct-Dec;22(4):205-10.
Neurophilosophy: an introduction and overview.
Churchland PS, Di Francesco M.
Funct Neurol. 2007 Oct-Dec;22(4):179-80.
Cue-evoked encoding of movement planning and execution in the rat nucleus accumbens.
Taha SA, Nicola SM, Fields HL.
J Physiol. 2007 Nov 1;584(Pt 3):801-18. Epub 2007 Aug 30.
Development and neuromodulation of spinal locomotor networks in the metamorphosing frog.
Rauscent A, Le Ray D, Cabirol-Pol MJ, Sillar KT, Simmers J, Combes D.
J Physiol Paris. 2006 Nov-Dec;100(5-6):317-27. Epub 2007 Jun 8.
Corticospinal involvement in volitional contractions.
Rothwell JC.
J Physiol. 2007 Oct 15;584(Pt 2):363. Epub 2007 Sep 13.
Spinal Mechanisms Contribute to Differences in the Time to Failure of Submaximal Fatiguing Contractions Performed with Different Loads.
Klass M, Levenez M, Enoka RM, Duchateau J.
J Neurophysiol. 2008 Jan 9 [Epub ahead of print]
The nature of corticospinal paths driving human motoneurones during voluntary contractions.
Butler JE, Larsen TS, Gandevia SC, Petersen NT.
J Physiol. 2007 Oct 15;584(Pt 2):651-9. Epub 2007 Aug 16.
Interaction between neocortical and hippocampal networks via slow oscillations.
Sirota A, Buzsáki G.
Thalamus Relat Syst. 2005 Dec;3(4):245-259.
Endogenous Inhibition and the Neural Basis of "Free Won't"
J. Neurosci. 27: 13919-13920
Giovanni Mirabella
Microstimulation and architectonics of frontoparietal cortex in common marmosets (Callithrix jacchus).
Burish MJ, Stepniewska I, Kaas JH.
J Comp Neurol. 2008 Mar 10;507(2):1151-68.
Repeated Electrical Stimulation of Reward-Related Brain Regions Affects Cocaine But Not "Natural" Reinforcement
Dino Levy, Maytal Shabat-Simon, Uri Shalev, Noam Barnea-Ygael, Ayelet Cooper, and Abraham Zangen
J. Neurosci. 27: 14179-14189
On-line control of grasping actions: object-specific motor facilitation requires sustained visual input.
Prabhu G, Lemon R, Haggard P.
J Neurosci. 2007 Nov 14;27(46):12651-4.
Mental simulation of action in the service of action perception.
Raos V, Evangeliou MN, Savaki HE.
J Neurosci. 2007 Nov 14;27(46):12675-83.
Effects of motor training on the recovery of manual dexterity after primary motor cortex lesion in macaque monkeys.
Murata Y, Higo N, Oishi T, Yamashita A, Matsuda K, Hayashi M, Yamane S.
J Neurophysiol. 2007 Dec 19 [Epub ahead of print]
Integration of light-controlled neuronal firing and fast circuit imaging.
Airan RD, Hu ES, Vijaykumar R, Roy M, Meltzer LA, Deisseroth K.
Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2007 Oct;17(5):587-92.
Techniques for extracting single-trial activity patterns from large-scale neural recordings.
Churchland MM, Yu BM, Sahani M, Shenoy KV.
Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2007 Oct;17(5):609-18.
Synaptic plasticity, memory and the hippocampus: a neural network approach to causality.
Neves G, Cooke SF, Bliss TV.
Nat Rev Neurosci. 2008 Jan;9(1):65-75.
2007 Gallery: Images of the Year.
Marris E.
Nature. 2007 Dec 20;450(7173):1144-1149.
Be smart, exercise your heart: exercise effects on brain and cognition.
Hillman CH, Erickson KI, Kramer AF.
Nat Rev Neurosci. 2008 Jan;9(1):58-65.
Behavioural report of single neuron stimulation in somatosensory cortex.
Houweling AR, Brecht M.
Nature. 2008 Jan 3;451(7174):65-8. Epub 2007 Dec 19.
Rapid changes in throughput from single motor cortex neurons to muscle activity.
Davidson AG, Chan V, O'Dell R, Schieber MH.
Science. 2007 Dec 21;318(5858):1934-7.
Locally dynamic synaptic learning rules in pyramidal neuron dendrites.
Harvey CD, Svoboda K.
Nature. 2007 Dec 20;450(7173):1195-200.
Mechanosensory Gating of Proprioceptor Input to Modulatory Projection Neurons
Mark P. Beenhakker, Matthew S. Kirby, and Michael P. Nusbaum
J. Neurosci. 27: 14308-14316
Focusing Effect of Acetylcholine on Neuroplasticity in the Human Motor Cortex
Min-Fang Kuo, Jan Grosch, Felipe Fregni, Walter Paulus, and Michael A. Nitsche
J. Neurosci. 27: 14442-14447
Action and Outcome Encoding in the Primate Caudate Nucleus
Brian Lau, and Paul W. Glimcher
J. Neurosci. 27: 14502-14514
Spinal Cord Injury: Present and Future Therapeutic Devices and Prostheses
Simon F. Giszter
Neurotherapeutics. Volume 5, Issue 1, January 2008, Pages 147-162
Task-related interaction between basal ganglia and cortical dopamine release.
Garraux G, Peigneux P, Carson RE, Hallett M.
J Neurosci. 2007 Dec 26;27(52):14434-41.
Do Corticomotoneuronal Cells Predict Target Muscle EMG Activity?
Griffin DM, Hudson HM, Belhaj-Saif A, McKiernan BJ, Cheney PD.
J Neurophysiol. 2007 Dec 26 [Epub ahead of print]
How robots will teach us how the brain works.
Ghazanfar AA, Turesson HK.
Nat Neurosci. 2008 Jan;11(1):3.
The development of brain-machine interface neuroprosthetic devices.
Patil PG, Turner DA.
Neurotherapeutics. 2008 Jan;5(1):137-46.
Systems Neuroplasticity in the Aging Brain: Recruiting Additional Neural Resources for Successful Motor Performance in Elderly Persons
Sofie Heuninckx, Nicole Wenderoth, and Stephan P. Swinnen
J. Neurosci. 28: 91-99
Face perception in monkeys reared with no exposure to faces.
Sugita Y.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2008 Jan 8;105(1):394-8. Epub 2008 Jan 2.
Daytime sleep condenses the time course of motor memory consolidation.
Korman M, Doyon J, Doljansky J, Carrier J, Dagan Y, Karni A.
Nat Neurosci. 2007 Sep;10(9):1206-13. Epub 2007 Aug 12.
One memory, two ways to consolidate?
Diekelmann S, Born J.
Nat Neurosci. 2007 Sep;10(9):1085-6.
Neuroscience. Rules of plasticity.
Brecht M, Schmitz D.
Science. 2008 Jan 4;319(5859):39-40.
Ongoing in vivo experience triggers synaptic metaplasticity in the neocortex.
Clem RL, Celikel T, Barth AL.
Science. 2008 Jan 4;319(5859):101-4.
Muscle proprioceptive feedback and spinal networks.
Windhorst U.
Brain Res Bull. 2007 Jul 12;73(4-6):155-202. Epub 2007 Apr 17.
Representation of moving wavefronts of whisker deflection in rat somatosensory cortex.
Drew PJ, Feldman DE.
J Neurophysiol. 2007 Sep;98(3):1566-80. Epub 2007 Jun 13.
From stimulus estimation to combination sensitivity: encoding and processing of amplitude and timing information in parallel, convergent sensory pathways.
Carlson BA, Kawasaki M.
J Comput Neurosci. 2008 Jan 5 [Epub ahead of print]
Neurostatistics: Applications, challenges and expectations.
Georgopoulos AP, Karageorgiou E.
Stat Med. 2008 Feb 10;27(3):407-17.
Kalman filter control of a model of spatiotemporal cortical dynamics
Steven J Schiff and Tim Sauer
J. Neural Eng. 5 1-8 2008
Neural representations of kinematic laws of motion: evidence for action-perception coupling.
Dayan E, Casile A, Levit-Binnun N, Giese MA, Hendler T, Flash T.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2007 Dec 18;104(51):20582-7. Epub 2007 Dec 13.
Somatic and motor components of action simulation.
Avenanti A, Bolognini N, Maravita A, Aglioti SM.
Curr Biol. 2007 Dec 18;17(24):2129-35.
A state-space framework for movement control to dynamic goals through brain-driven interfaces.
Srinivasan L, Brown EN.
IEEE Trans Biomed Eng. 2007 Mar;54(3):526-35.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Presents yay!
I got home from birthday lunch and my Neuro Fuzzy rice cooker was waiting for me. I will report back on the rice quality and whether it pneumatically inserts an electrode in my brain, bellowing rice-agenda commands directly into my psyche.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Link dump (Part 1)
I'm busy with prelim stuff and turning 30 today. So, to tide you guys and gals over, here are some of the older stories I didn't get to while they were 'fresh'. I should be posting SPF this Friday.
ALS: X-Prize competition sponsored by Harvard, stem cell therapy showing promise, documentary by director with ALS.
BCI (general): Review of first international BCI meeting, Myomo e100 BCI for rehab, generator running off tiny vibrations, transmitting data over bones.
Computer-tech: Ionic wind engines for cooling.
Education and society: Nature reviews The Open Laboratory, Wired's take on Nature Precedings, interesting perspective on military applications of neuroscience, why I cannot fathom working at the molecular level, THE neuro news site (DANA Foundation).
Futurism: A brief rundown of Kurzweil-type stuff.
HCI/Alternative interfaces: More on Microsoft mind reading, website design (not what you're expecting - related to how I think humans should be engaged in experimentation), Minority Report type interface, funky looking light operated interface.
Implant: Memory chip implant, first person account of using hearing aids, brain reorganization with cochlear implant, DBS for epilepsy, brain chipping our troops, overview of vagus nerve stimulation, auditory nerve implant (x2).
Thursday, January 17, 2008
SPF delay
Here's a video on a drunken squirrel to make up for it.
Running with the story
The speculation was right. Looks like Oscar Pistorius is too fast for the Olympics. I wonder what would have happened if he had not tried as hard. You know, hold back a little, maybe throw a race or two. Then blow everyone out of the water at the Olympics. That would be awesome to watch.
[Wired props]
Anyhow, The Onion has their take on it. (Highly recommended.)
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
BCI news items
No mention of a paper with some objective measures, but a pretty decent write-up available on the NYTimes site. There's even a nice schematic and video.
Interview by PhysOrg with EEG mogul Fatourechi, related to a paper published in JNE. Take a gander here.
Science and Society
Two articles worth noting for all scientists.
Oh science and religion. Will you two ever get along? A speech by the Pope is being protested in Italy by the scientific community there due to comments made about Galileo's trial by the church. Wired has the scoop.
And a little closer to home, and MUCH overdue idea may finally be realized. There is a push for a science related debate among presidential candidates in the US elections. Holy crap! What can politicians say when they are forced to use actual facts? There is a major downside to this, though. If this debate becomes a mainstay, the politicization of science will be in full effect. In other words, right now both parties site a statistic and toss a softball at the opposing party, usually in the form on some minor factoid. If things move in this direction, we're talking a concerted effort by special interest groups to skew data. On top of that, by politicizing science, science itself becomes less trusted in the public's eyes, which means more troubles with funding and policy decisions. Do we really want people thinking, "Oh, I would agree with this finding, but I know you're in the pocket of Big Tectonics, so I assume there is an agenda here." Either way, I'm excited that this might go forward THIS YEAR. Again, Wired has the 411.
This rice cooker is smarter than you
Seriously. I mean really? Are we REALLY there? What am I talking about? This rice cooker uses Neurofuzzy algorithms to cook the best rice ever. It must be the best rice ever, because I have decided so. I have to get one simply because, I mean, it, you know, OMG it is cool. (Plus, the carcinogenic non-stick surface on my current one is flaking off from around 10 years of semi-regular use.)
Sorry things have been slow lately. I've been very distracted by work and school stuff, and I plan to make it up real soon.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Loreal's upcoming market
Cells sell
Saturday, January 5, 2008
New senses
OMG I feel like this cold is going to kill me. Ugh.
Anyhow, bitching aside, Reddit caught what I am assuming is actually an older article on Wired on the idea of adding new senses by harnessing plasticity. Let's set aside the idea that all our more primitive portions of neural gooeyness are not designed to just lump new senses on top of old ones, what would be considered a "new sense"?
Some eels can detect distortions in a self generated electromagnetic field around their bodies, but that's all I can really think of off hand. Generally, there is a very basic fallacy that all these articles miss: transducing one phenomena into another sense violates the idea of bringing into existence a new sense. In other words, like in this article, adding vibrotactile pads to indicate the distance above the ground (by vibration frequency) is not really "sensing" gravity. You're sensing vibrational frequency. If you lose the ability to detect haptic feedback, you lose your "gravity" sense. The same is not true of our other senses. But, to play Devil's advocate, at a base level everything is transformed into nerve impulses. And yet, to play the Devil's Devil's advocate (I swear that's the title of a heavy metal song), each of our senses as its own wiring that is oodles more complicated than "sensation A is detected by cell type A, and then that just goes to 'the brain'".
Anyhow, a similar self-mutilation type version was discussed earlier on DNI, and the article links to the writer's blog, which is decent, though not updated very often. Worthy of an RSS sub at least.
Friday, January 4, 2008
The 10k club
Just a quick note. This month we hit the 10,000 visitor mark, and there have been around 17,000 page views (in 6.5 months)! Pretty cool for a shoot-from-the-hip decision under massive sleep deprivation!
Rockin'.
Thursday, January 3, 2008
Webcam multitouch
And while I'm at it, might as well post this Minority Report type interface using the Wiimote as well. I have to say that the Wii has inspired some crazy-awesome interface hacks that get me excited about what will soon be available. Hey, the hardware and drivers are there, the manufacturing is in place (and cheap!), so all we need is someone to tie it all together. And give me 20%.
Mechano-Synaesthetin'
Before the post, I should say I feel like death warmed over from some bug I caught. But, I was stirred enough by Obama's acceptance speech in Iowa to pull out of my haze and post.
io9 is just posting a slew of stuff, mostly scifi related, but also gems like this. The vibrotactile stimulator pictured above is attached to a camera, where grayscale information varies the speed of vibration. Again, nothing really "new" other than that this is an active probing usage.
I can't find the links now, but an example of previous efforts include BrainPort which uses a camera attached to a grid of piston-like pieces that apply pressure based on grayscale info. Still very cool and more practical for those who want, but don't need, the experience.
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
I'm thinking of something dwelling-like...
Though not Earth-shattering, I thought I would post a quick mention of an article on io9 to highlight the site. Fun sci-fi meets advanced real-world technology and design. I think they claim it is the site for people that live a 'beta' existence - final release of anything is already outdated. Worth a bookmark or RSS sub IMO.
Anyhow, the article relates to a PLoS article on tool versus dwelling perception, and how using MRI, researchers at CMU (and I assume the CNBC) trained a computer algoritm (assuming again, that it's a Bayesian Classifier or 3-layer ANN, haven't read the article yet) to tell if a person was looking at a picture of a house-type-thing or tool. Not surprising, really, since tools tend to activate areas associated with their use, like PM, MI, IPS, etc. I bet they would get mixed results if they showed houses images with various levels of usage items prominence - like door handles, lawn hoses, shovels sitting in the front yard, etc.