Researchers are discovering that they get better results in some tasks by combining the signals from multiple brain-computer interface (BCI) users.
Until now, this “collaborative BCI” technique has been used in simple pattern-recognition tasks, but a team at the University of Essex in the UK wanted to test it more rigorously, New Scientist reports.
So they developed a simulator in which pairs of BCI… read more
Prototype software can give early warnings of disease or violence outbreaks by spotting clues in news reports.
Researchers have created software that predicts when and where disease outbreaks might occur, based on two decades of New York Times articles and other online data. The research comes from Microsoft and the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, MIT Technology Review reports.
The system could someday help aid organizations and… read more
A new augmented reality headset from Meta puts a full twin-display digital environment — controlled by two-hand 3D tracking — in front of the user, Slashgear reports.
The prototype headset uses Epson Moverio BT-100 see-through glasses with a low-latency 3D camera mounted on top.
Both components reportedly feed into custom electronics in a separate wearable computer, which can track individual fingertips and… read more
University of Alberta (UA) researchers have discovered that a zebrafish’s stem cells can selectively regenerate its damaged photoreceptor cells.
UA lead researcher Ted Allison says that for some time geneticists have known that stem cells in zebrafish can replace damaged vision cells.
Rods and cones are the most important photoreceptors. In humans, rods provide us with night vision while cones give us… read more
Scientists at The Methodist Hospital Research Institute have found a possible way to fool the immune system to prevent it from recognizing and destroying nanoparticles before they deliver their drug payloads.
“Our goal was to make a particle that is camouflaged within our bodies and escapes the surveillance of the immune system to reach its target undiscovered,” said Department of Medicine Co-Chair Ennio Tasciotti, Ph.D.,… read more
Neuroscientists have found a way to watch neurons fire in an independently moving animal for the first time. The study was done in fish, but it may hold clues to how the human brain works, Science Now reports.
Junichi Nakai of Saitama University’s Brain Science Institute in Japan and colleagues selected a glowing marker known as green fluorescent protein (GFP) and linked it to a compound that… read more
Representative Steve Israel, Democrat of New York wants to extend an existing law, set to expire this year, that makes weapons that are undetectable by security scanners — like a printed all-plastic gun — illegal, The New York Times reports.
But there are also major technical obstacles to creating an entire gun on a 3-D printer, not the least of which is that a plastic gun would… read more
There’s a wobbly new biochemical structure in Burckhard Seelig’s lab at the University of Minnesota that may resemble what enzymes looked like billions of years ago, when life on earth began to evolve.
Seelig created the fledgling enzyme by using directed evolution in the laboratory.
Working with team members, he subsequently determined its structure.. Lab tests show that the enzyme… read more
Hydrogen has tremendous potential as an eco-friendly fuel, but it is expensive to produce. Now researchers at Princeton University and Rutgers University have moved a step closer to harnessing nature to produce hydrogen.
The team, led by Princeton chemistry professor Annabella Selloni, takes inspiration from bacteria that make hydrogen from water, using enzymes called di-iron hydrogenases.
Cheap components = cost-effective
They used… read more
Setting up a lunar base could be made much simpler by using a 3D printer to build it from local materials.
Renowned architects Foster + Partners have joined with ESA to test the feasibility of 3D printing using simulated lunar soil (regolith).
The architects devised a weight-bearing “catenary” dome design with a cellular structured wall to shield against micrometeoroids and space radiation, incorporating a… read more
New York University physicists have developed a method for moving microscopic particles, using a blue light to prompt colloids to move and then assemble — much like birds flock and move together in flight.
The method could enhance the design of a range of industrial products, including the architecture of electronics.
The work addresses a fundamental question in nature — what causes flocks and… read more
University of Cambridge scientists have created a new type of microchip that allows information to travel in three dimensions, enabling additional storage capacity on chips.
Currently, microchips can only pass digital information in a very limited way — from either left to right or front to back, the researchers say.
In the future, a 3D microchip would enable additional storage capacity on chips by… read more
Two common enzymes, catalase* and urease*, show movement in the presence of their respective substrate (hydrogen peroxide or urea, which act as fuel), Pennsylvania State University researchers Peter J. Butler, Ayusman Sen, and colleagues have found in experiments.
The finding has “important implications in areas ranging from biological transport to the design of ‘intelligent,’ enzyme-powered, autonomous nano- and micromotors, which are expected to find applications in bottom-up assembly… read more
Researchers at the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) and the University of Barcelona in Spain have discovered a biomaterial that can generate new differentiated neural stem cells, as part of a project to develop an implant that allows brain repair and regeneration.
The team tested different types of polylactic acid (PLA), a biodegradable material allowing neural cell adhesion and growth. They found that PLA with… read more
Rex the bionic man shows how close technology is to catching up with — and exceeding — the abilities of the human body, The Guardian reports.
Housed within a frame of state-of-the-art prosthetic limbs is a functional heart-lung system, complete with artificial blood pumping through a network of pulsating modified-polymer arteries.
He has a bionic spleen to clean the blood, and an artificial pancreas to keep… read more