In an upcoming conference of the 93rd annual Ecological Society of America meeting, the USGS will be reporting on recent successes of research programs directly involving citizen scientists.
From bees, dust, and a 40-year historical overview of birding amateur science, the conference will be filled with fine examples of the productivity and effectiveness of citizen science efforts.
So, we have another positive report to the professional scientific community of how useful citizen science can be, and how we all can benefit from the personal enjoyment of amateur science while helping develop new knowledge for the greater scientific community. “USGS Science at Ecological Society of America” :: USGS Release :: July 23, 2008 :: [ READ PRESS RELEASE ]
It might not be immediately obvious how research developments in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS — or, Lou Gehrig’s Disease) would be appropriate to follow here on Neuron News. However, this author has a personal family member currently dealing with the devastating disease, so we’ve been personally reviewing the progress in the field. And, with a little trivial forward thinking, there is an important connection with the advancement of neurotechnology.
Yesterday, a collaboration between Columbia and Harvard Universities announced in Science a fabulous new development that offers promise in the short-term discovery of drugs as well as longer term neuro-therapeutic technologies.
Credit: J. T. Dimos et al., Science Express
The key problem with ALS patients is that motor neurons–particularly those affecting function in breathing and swallowing–degenerate and die off for unknown reasons. So, the general idea of this research program is to develop a technique to take skins cells of a patient and convert them into stem cells, or the “universal cell” that can potentially turn itself into any other cell given just the right biochemical nudge. Now, with a vast supply of genetically appropriate stem cells that will agree with the personal biology of the patient, convert them into motor neurons and implant them into regions of the body to integrate into neural systems that have been severely degraded by the disease.
This is certainly an exciting development for nearing potential therapies for ALS, although real clinical progress is likely still many years away. If you know of anyone affected by ALS or are interested in supporting the research, please thoroughly read the articles referenced below and consider a donation to The ALS Association.
Specifically, if neuroprosthetic devices are to be successfully integrated into the nervous system of a human being, it seems reasonable that the genetic make-up of the neurons living on the implanted device should compatible, if not identical, to the genetics of the host neurons. There might be unrealized neuro-communication factors that are influenced by genetic coding, and a fully successful device might need to be grown using neurons developed directly from the human host.
“Harvard-Columbia Team Creates Neurons from ALS Patient’s Skin Cells” :: CUMC News :: July 31, 2008 :: [ READ CUMC Press Release ]
“Stem Cell Breakthrough in ALS Research” :: ScienceNOW Daily News :: July 31, 2008 :: [ READ ]
“Stem cell technique is ‘significant advance'” :: Telegraph.co.uk :: August 1, 2008 :: [ READ ]
An upcoming BioBlitz scheduled on Long Island in the Tanglewood Preserve has the local academia and the local amateur scientists excited… and the event might also have piqued some interest from producers at The Discovery Channel.
The BioBlitz is an interesting movement where community members designate a 24-hour period to canvass their local region and identify and catalog all of the organisms that can be observed. This concept is a perfect idea and opportunity to unite citizen scientists and local professional scientists to help keep track of regional biodiversity, species evolution, and environmental impacts on the local biosphere.
The following report suggests an unofficial interest from The Discovery Channel to document one such event, which would be a wonderful publicity boon to supporting the role of the citizen scientist and will certainly inspire many more to look into opportunities in their local areas.
“Bio Blitz catches Discovery’s attention” :: Herald Community Newspapers Online :: July 31, 2008 :: [ READ ]
Learn more about the BioBlitz movement and to find events in your area [ BioBlitz on Wikipedia ].
But, there are certainly a lot of people trying to figure it out, and this author at Neuron News is certainly swimming in this ocean of many fish.
Here we reference a new list of published books that take another stab a cracking the code of the miraculous human mind. Brief reviews are written for each book, and Neuron News is neither subscribing to nor endorsing any particular approach… however, nearly any viewpoint on the brain is worth a look-see when one has no honest clue about what is really going on (and no one can honestly say that they have a fundamental grasp of brain function… we are just not there, yet.)
In the near future, Neuron News will likely plan on picking up a copy of A Universe of Consciousness: How Matter Becomes Imagination by Gerald M. Edelman and Giulio Tononi, so we will certainly let you know what we think. But, in the mean time please feel free to browse the collection and reviews, and let Neuron News know what you think by posting comments here in the journal.
“How the Mind Works: Revelations” :: The New York Review of Books :: Volume 55, Number 11 :: June 26, 2008 :: [ READ REVIEW ]
The Wilderness Institute at the University of Montana features a Citizen Science program that is a wonderful opportunity for our amateur research friends up north to explore their local natural wildlands and contribute to the region’s scientific monitoring.
They consider the contributions from their volunteers to be quite valuable and they seems quite supportive of the citizen science movement. The institute has programs going on right now, so visit the website by following the link below and contact the group to join in the activities. You might even make into an upcoming photogallery update!
If you are a Citizen Scientist involved with the Wilderness Institute, please let us know about your experiences by posting a comment below.
Not living in Montana, but want to explore a wilderness near you? Check out the national locater map at Wilderness.net sponsored by The University of Montana’s College of Forestry and Conservation.
Visualize a computer chip for a moment… it’s a “flat”, 2-dimensional piece of electronics that does some fancy electron dance somewhere within the green-toned plastic. Now, visualize what a neurological computer chip might look like… how about we start with the same flat, green-toned plastic electrical processing unit and toss on a bunch of living neural cells scrambled all over the surface.
This sort of technological device–which is not entirely science fiction–is this idea of a two-dimensional, cultured neuron network interfaced with a microfabricated electrical circuit. This system in no way resembles the network structuring seen in the human brain, so the first immediate question would be to ask why would this living, 2-D neuron network successfully electrically interface with the brain?
Well, that is a good question… but this 2-D world was (and still is) a reasonable starting point for developing the technology. In fact, because the 2-D world is still an important system for developing merged devices composed of electrical circuits and living networked neurons, developing an understanding of the fundamental neuron network function–in two dimensions–is still critical and valuable for neurotechnological research.
But, the brain is still in three dimensions, so advancing the technology to grow cultured neuron networks in controlled ways in 3-D is quite exciting. With a current published article inNature Methods, researchers from the University of California Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab have begun some initial work on controlling the cultured growth of neurons in three dimensions along the bumps of blobs of colloidal crystals.
Micron-sized colloidal particles (i.e., really tiny balls made of clear plastic) are interesting for patterning neuron networks, because there has been a great deal of work on learning how to manipulate these objects using focused laser light called optical tweezers. If the wavelength of the laser beam is selected appropriately, then the living neurons will not absorb the wavelength and heat up and die. So, additional modifications to the underlying colloidal matrix could be made to the system while the neurons were growing and interconnecting along the 3-D lattice.
“Colloidal crystals make better neural networks” :: Ars Technica :: July 28, 2008 :: [ READ ]
“Colloid-guided assembly of oriented 3D neuronal networks” :: Nature Methods :: published online July 20, 2008 :: (doi:10.1038/nmeth.1236) [ READ ABSTRACT ]
