“Case was twenty-four. At twenty-two, he’d been a cowboy, a rustler, one of the best in the Sprawl…jacked into a custom cyberspace deck that projected his disembodied consciousness into the consensual hallucination that was the matrix.”
– William Gibson
(Nanowerk News) European and Indian researchers are applying principles learned from living organisms to design self-organizing networks of wireless sensors suitable for a wide range of environmental monitoring purposes.
http://www.nanowerk.com/news/newsid=6901.php
Jacking in aims for the mass market. The headset is based on raw EEG readings, so is at a very limited level of granularity, but still.
“The exact source of the electrical activity the headset is picking up may not be important, said Dr. Jonathan Wolpaw, chief of the laboratory for nervous system disorders at the Wadsworth Center of the New York State Department of Health in Albany. He uses EEG caps as part of brain-computer interfaces for severely paralyzed people. His systems record brain activity alone, but for a consumer game device, a cap that picks up a mixture of brain and muscle activity may be acceptable.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/08/technology/08novel.html?_r=1&ref=technology&oref=slogin
I once presented on the ideas in Neurosphere and a guy in the audience said, “it’s already here, it’s called Second Life.”
“A research team led by professor Jun’ichi Ushiba of the Keio University Biomedical Engineering Laboratory has developed a BCI system that lets the user walk an avatar through the streets of Second Life while relying solely on the power of thought.”
http://www.pinktentacle.com/2007/10/brain-computer-interface-for-second-life/
Merging one’s personal filters and pointers with the mobile environment. Mark-up the world.
“Keep all your bookmarks in delicious and access them from home, office, anywhere.”
del.icio.us
Intensively location based services – where you at?
http://www.boostmobile.com/
Tip of the Neurohat to Robbie Blinkoff of Context-Based Research Group
“In a patent application, an Austin-based startup called EEStor promised “technologies for replacement of electrochemical batteries,” meaning a motorist could plug in a car for five minutes and drive 500 miles roundtrip between Dallas and Houston without gasoline. EEStor’s secret ingredient is a material sandwiched between thousands of wafer-thin metal sheets, like a series of foil-and-paper gum wrappers stacked on top of each other. Charged particles stick to the metal sheets and move quickly across EEStor’s proprietary material. The result is an ultracapacitor, a battery-like device that stores and releases energy quickly.”
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=3547157&page=1
tip o the neurohat to FUTUREdition from the Arlington Institute.
and more war.
More than 130 veterans of the Iraq war now face the daunting challenge of learning to live with a missing arm. To make that transition easier, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or Darpa, has launched a $55-million project that pools the efforts of prosthetics experts nationwide to create a thought-controlled bionic arm that duplicates the functions of a natural limb.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science/09/05/bionic.arm/index.html
Well, it’s better than technology development driven throught weapons research.
“Hitachi’s scientists are set to develop a brain TV remote controller letting users turn a TV on and off or switch channels by only thinking.”
http://www.technewsworld.com/story/57980.html
This blog has highlighted gains toward technology interfaces to neurons. This study advances understanding of the action of neurons themselves toward forming memory.
“This time, Ben-Jacob and graduate student Itay Baruchi, who led the study, targeted inhibitory neurons to try to bring some order to their neural network. They mounted the cell culture on a polymer panel studded with electrodes, which enabled Ben-Jacob and Baruchi to monitor the patterns created by firing neurons. All of the cells on the electrode array came from the cortex, the outermost layer of the brain known for its role in memory formation.”
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=0306422B-E7F2-99DF-3809798634B2D416&chanID=sa003
Another instance of progress through war.
“The thumb and fingers can move and grip just like a human hand and are controlled by the patient’s mind and muscles. It was invented by David Gow and was designed and built by Touch Bionics, which is based in Livingston. The technology has been tested by a number of people, including US soldiers who lost limbs in the Iraq war.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/6901231.stm