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Scoop.it!
Use a space-based vision of our planet to explore the web of connections that sustain life on Earth. Via Gust MEES 
Scoop.it!
Would you give your brain a jolt if a Harvard scientist said it could make you smarter, more creative and less depressed? - This couldn’t possibly be a good idea. On Friday the 13th of September, in an old brick building on 13th Street in Boston’s Charlestown neighborhood, a pair of electrodes was attached to my forehead, one over my brain’s left prefrontal cortex, the other just above my right eye socket. I was about to undergo transcranial direct-current stimulation, or tDCS, an experimental technique for delivering extremely low dose electrical stimulation to the brain. Using less than 1 percent of the electrical energy necessary for electroconvulsive therapy, powered by an ordinary nine-volt battery, tDCS has been shown in hundreds of studies to enhance an astonishing, seemingly implausible variety of intellectual, emotional and movement-related brain functions. And its side effects appear limited to a mild tingling at the site of the electrode, sometimes a slight reddening of the skin, very rarely a headache and certainly no seizures or memory loss. Still, I felt more than a bit apprehensive as I prepared to find out if a little bit of juice could amp up my cognitive reserves and make me, in a word, smarter. Via Wildcat2030, luiy
luiy's curator insight,
November 3, 2013 11:07 AM
The first modern experiments with tDCS came in fits and starts. In 1981, Niels Birbaumer, a neuroscientist at the University of Tübingen, Germany, reported that by applying extremely low doses of direct-current electricity — one-third of a milliamp, not enough to power a hearing aid — to the heads of healthy volunteers, he could speed their response on a simple test of reaction time. The Italian neurophysiologist Alberto Priori began his own experiments in 1992, applying just a tiny bit more electricity, about half a milliamp. He found that enough of the electricity crossed through volunteers’ skulls — electrons flowing from the cathodal electrode to the anodal electrode — to cause brain cells near the anodal to become excited. Despite repeating the experiment multiple times to be sure of the results, it took Priori six years to get his findings published in a scientific journal, in 1998. As he told me, “People kept telling me it can’t be true, it’s too easy and simple.” |
Scoop.it!
Est considérée comme étant de l’“art robotique” toute œuvre utilisant des technologies robotiques ou automatisées. Certaines de ces réalisations intègrent des robots, d’autres les placent au cœur du dispositif de création, donnant ainsi vie à des œuvres qui n’auraient jamais pu évoluer sans cette contribution robotique. Il arrive que ces robots soient anthropomorphes mais ici, l’exposition Art robotique privilégie ceux dont la forme s’éloigne de la simple copie du corps humain (extrait du Communiqué de presse). La Cité des sciences et de l’industrie, en collaboration avec Epidemic, lance une exposition d’envergure à la croisée de l'art, de la science et de la technologie. Une vingtaine d’œuvres dynamiques et spectaculaires, dont la plupart sont inédites pour le public français, prendront place durant neuf mois sur un espace de 1 600 m². Via Jacques Urbanska
Scoop.it!
Dec. 2 - A team of scientists has demonstrated that a coordinated group of pre-programmed, autonomous robots can do the job of building workers, constructing... (Are these swiss developed flying robots the builders of the future? Via Dr. Susan Bainbridge
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Use a space-based vision of our planet to explore the web of connections that sustain life on Earth.