You know what I needed to rise up to this morning? Michael J Fox playing Johnny B Goode, just like he did in Back To The Future. But not a clip from the film — how about Mr Fox himself rocking it out today? More »
Stanford scientists discover that by changing a mouse’s neurons to respond to light, they could use fiber optic cables to influence the mouse to do certain things. The trick is to insert plant genes into the brain first. More »
Researchers somehow found volunteers willingto accept electrical shocks while playing video games. Ooookay. The study’s mostly good news though: Small zaps to the brain might help Parkinson’s patients. The bad news? They’d turn us into bad video game players. More »
Scientists have injected a mouse with a chemical that makes its brain glow where there’s activity, and implanted a tiny camera directly inside the hippocampus to watch what’s going on. The team at Nara Institute of Science and Technology in Japan are using the 0.1-inch-long camera to look for information on brain activity that causes tremors. They hope the results may lead to better treatments for Parkinson’s disease, and if successful they may also experiment with humans. We can’t imagine how strange it would be to know your brain’s being watched from inside your head. [Fareastgizmos]
