January 06, 2008
iLimb Arm Unnaturally Powerful
Accompanying Touch Bionics' prosthetic finger and hand (shown above), comes the iLimb Arm. It's interesting to read how its superhuman capabilities may be intentionally scaled back before they will become available. Hacking the limb to its designed capabilities may become more akin to unlocking than overclocking.
Programming DNA
Drew Endy presents on MIT's genetic reverse-engineering, developing a human-readable, high-level programming language, and leading a worldwide academic effort to develop open-source bio-objects. He proposes reprogramming bacterial DNA as one form of nano-engineering. Video documentation, found here, also covers a brief history of genetic decoding in terms of Accelerating Returns, safety protocols, and a speculative future of bio-hacking communities.
link via Hackaday
December 11, 2007
Threshing Nokia's "Eco Sensor Concept" Part 1
On its simplest and hardly unique level, sensors acquire data that can be shared over networks, visualized, logged, etc. The form-factor combines a "wearable sensor unit" inexplicably detached from a "dedicated mobile phone".
The (perhaps deliberately) distracting issue with the concept is its inconsistent specificity. The concept's sidebar links to Nokia's actual sustainable practices including materials, energy-saving strategies, etc. were actually informative; while the concept itself is convoluted with seemingly random levels of detail and environmental justification. The presentation of Nokia's Eco Sensor Concept is unfortunately obfuscated by a combination of existing, emerging, and speculative technologies and heart-strings chaff.
The photo-realistic images detract from the overall presentation. They're not meant to convey anything useful, yet open themselves up to interpretation, and in this case, scrutiny and consternation. They present unexplained dummy data visualizations on button-less screens, which also counter the extinct notion of a "dedicated mobile phone". The scale of the devices is indeterminate, the only hint of a user interface is visually glazed over, and the apparent full-touchcreen is reminiscent of Nokia's aeon concept and BenQ-Siemens Black Box concept phone.
[via engadgetmobile]
(see Part 2 for sensors and wearability)
November 28, 2007
Metallicat
Apparently, cats do land on their feet. Sometimes. "Baby" has also apparently fallen on her back, but she's proven to be quite a resilient kitty. But does she have a life counter?
[link via boingboing]
November 21, 2007
Stem Cells, Hold the Huevos
An end to the embryonic stem cell controversy is now increasingly likely. Although further such research may need to continue for now, scientists just announced a promising alternative. The successful reprogramming of human skin cells towards various human tissue types implies a major step towards a slew of therapies genetically matched to patients with a wide range of conditions.
At last week's LA Life Extension Workshop, the upcoming challenge of initial breakthroughs, followed by the Law of Accelerating returns, was gospel. Days later, it seems we are on our way to transitional research that can leave major ethical debate behind for a while, and catalyze funding and treatment that will prolong and save lives.
[MSNBC links via Propeller, and a sidebar of related articles]
November 17, 2007
Life Extension Workshop datablast
In this quick digest about my attendance of the Life Extension Workshop yesterday, I will drop a lot of names and links on you while I attempt to digest the profound content of the day. Thanks to everyone whom I met for being so cool and sharing your passion for your interests; even when you could not talk about certain things for various reasons.
The presenters and panelists included Doctors Stephen Coles, Aubrey de Grey, and Michael Rose, followed by David Kekich and Peter Voss. I will be helping Dr. Coles post video online; I'll post when and where that will be available.
Gerontology Research Group
Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence (SENS)
M Prize
Methuselah Foundation
Benford & Rose
Gregory Benford
Persona Foundation
GTCbio
Mediox
There were various plugs for books, which will reach you through links, slides, and video of the workshop. I want to mention a book that was not part of the day's official proceedings, which I learned of when I met Gregory Benford. He and Elisabeth Malarte have authored Beyond Human: Living with Robots and Cyborgs, and I'm excited to check it out.
November 12, 2007
Life Extension Workshop- new schedule
Now beginning at 2PM:
2:00-2:30 Steve Coles
2:30-3:30 Aubrey de Grey
4:00-4:30 Michael Rose
4:30-5:30 Coles, de Grey, Rose (moderator: David Kekich)
location unchanged
seats are still available
[internal link]
November 07, 2007
Life Extension Workshop in LA 11/16
"Aubrey de Grey will be giving a Life Extension Workshop on Friday Nov
16th from 3pm to 5:30pm. Specifically, he will be giving an update on
SENS and the MPrize (more on that below).
Aubrey is a computer scientist, biomedical gerontologist, editor of
Rejuvenation Research and author the book "Ending Aging'..."
RSVP
[via Chuck Esterbrook on the BarCampLA mailing list]
Yes, you read that correctly: "Ending Aging"
Amazon lists it as #1 in some categories, including Physiology.
Location:
Embassy Suites LA - Int. Airport/South
1440 E. Imperial Ave, El Segundo, CA 90245
310-640-3600
*** To reserve a seat, forward this message to bruce@novamente.net
with your name and the names of any guests.
Adapted from the book description and Wikipedia pages:
MUST WE AGE?
A long life in a healthy, vigorous, youthful body has always been one
of humanity's greatest dreams. Recent progress in genetic
manipulations and calorie-restricted diets in laboratory animals hold
forth the promise that someday science will enable us to exert total
control over our own biological aging.
Nearly all scientists who study the biology of aging agree that we
will someday be able to substantially slow down the aging process,
extending our productive, youthful lives. Dr. Aubrey de Grey is
perhaps the most bullish of all such researchers. As has been reported
in media outlets ranging from 60 Minutes to The New York Times, Dr. de
Grey believes that the key biomedical technology required to eliminate
aging-derived debilitation and death entirely—technology that would
not only slow but periodically reverse age-related physiological
decay, leaving us biologically young into an indefinite future—is now
within reach.
Aubrey has created a detailed plan called Strategies for Engineered
Negligible Senescence (SENS) which is aimed at preventing age-related
physical and cognitive decline. He is also the co-founder (with David
Gobel) and chief scientist of the Methuselah Foundation, a ...
nonprofit organization. A major activity of the Methuselah Foundation
is the Methuselah Mouse Prize, a prize designed to accelerate research
into effective life extension interventions by awarding monetary
prizes to researchers who extend the lifespan of mice to unprecedented
lengths.
Regarding this, de Grey stated in March 2005 "if we are to bring about
real regenerative therapies that will benefit not just future
generations, but those of us who are alive today, we must encourage
scientists to work on the problem of aging". The prize reached US$4.2
million in February 2007. de Grey believes that once dramatic life
extension of already middle-aged mice has been achieved, a large
amount of funding will be diverted to this kind of research, which
would accelerate progress in doing the same for humans.
Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, pledged $3.5 Million to the
Methuselah Foundation for SENS research. Justin Bonomo, professional
poker player, has pledged 5% of his tournament winnings for SENS
research.
There is more at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aubrey_de_Grey
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategies_for_Engineered_Negligible_Senescence
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mprize
Again, it's on Friday Nov 16th from 3pm to 5:30pm.
*** To reserve a seat, forward this message to bruce@novamente.net
with your name and the names of any guests.
Hope to see some of you there,
-Chuck
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
BarcampLA Wiki: http://barcamp.org/BarCampLosAngeles
BarcampLA Blog: http://www.barcampla.org/
BarcampLA Group: http://groups.google.com/group/BarcampLA?hl=en
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
October 31, 2006
Oxycyte: Better Than Blood?
Artificial blood, is it the next big thing? This article from Popular Science about Oxycyte, and artificial blood gives me hope, after all blood is one of the most basic elements of our body, and if we can improve that, we improve a huge element of what makes us human.
A man-made, pure-white compound called Oxycyte carries oxygen 50 times as effectively as our own blood. Researchers are betting that it’s the best way to treat America’s leading cause of accidental death: traumatic brain injury.
It's like the oil that greases our fleshy engine, and I for one would like to switch to something that will give me a little more oomph, and a few extra years. Maybe Oxycyte isn't it, but the idea of replacing our blood with something better doesn't seem that far off.
August 23, 2006
Otto-Bock C-Leg and Össur Rheo Knee: Obsolete technology?
“The world’s first powered prosthesis for above-knee amputees, the POWER KNEE offers unprecedented levels of functionality and performance. It replaces true muscle activity to bend and straighten the knee as required.
When walking on level ground, the user is gently propelled forward, allowing greater distances to be covered without becoming as tired as before. On stairs and inclines the knee actively lifts the user up the next step, producing a secure and natural ascent, foot over foot. By gathering sensory information one step ahead of the prosthesis, the POWER KNEE is unique in its ability to anticipate and pro-actively provide the function appropriate to daily activities.”
Speaking as an amputee, I firmly believe this is the kick in the rear the prosthetics industry has needed. This sort of technology undoubtedly will pave the way for a whole new generation of input/output devices for virtually anything you could imagine.
The down side? While the C-Leg and Rheo knee boast microprocessor controlled swing phase adjustment, the fact is the vast majority of amputees are totally unable to afford such technology. Health insurance companies refuse to pay for these products, regardless of the fact that the current substandard prosthetics impart a great deal of stress and physical wear to the amputee’s body.
When an amputee who visits the same prosthetist as I couldn’t get his insurance company to pay for the Power Knee, he paid for the Power Knee out of pocket, a rough estimate by my prosthetist totaled well over $96,000. Seeing as out-of-pocket simply isn't a possibility for myself and so many others, I’d love to know who the 6 Million Dollar Man’s health insurance provider was!
[ Link ]
July 14, 2006
Prosthetic Fishing Rod
Robert Haag put together this captian hook style prosthetic arm that instead of a hook, has a line, and a hook, on a Spiderman fishing pole. It's an amazing project that he made for his son, and this video is way too cute.
This neat thing is part of the Open Prosthetics Project, which has the tag line "Prosthetics shouldn't cost an arm and a leg", is all about producing cheap and useful prosthetics. This is a great start!
[ Link via boingboing / the MAKE blog. Video from the Open Prosthetics Project, uploaded to youtube to save on their bandwidth. ]
May 11, 2006
Top 15 Tips for Longer Life
Here are the Top 15 Tips to Live Longer, from Forbes.
Then, if you want to get serious about it, I recommend checking out the book Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever by premier futurist Ray Kurzweil.
[ Link via Wired News ]
April 01, 2006
Transhumanists & Society
When I was younger, I was occasionally called a nerd, mostly because when I wasn't able to become wildly social with my peers, I turned to computers- one thing I could control and completely own mentally. Like most others who had similar experiences, I'm no longer called a nerd, but instead the more favorable term, "geek". I get this respect because this social group has grown through the dot com boom, and the push of the world wide web. I no longer wish to hide my interests as a geek, but stand tall.
Transhumanists though, while a subset of geeks, are less understood. In fact the idea of modifying oneself seems outright alien to many. The idea of pushing one's human shell to the limits to improve performance, and lifespan is even threatening to some. I myself have had conversations with people where I've expressed my desire to live for centuries instead of just one, and found myself in an argument about playing god. Nevertheless the goals of the transhumanist movement are appealing to many, which Stacy Robinson addresses in her book Transhumanism Reloaded:
...It may be a mistake to dismiss the transhumanists as a harmless group of under-socialized techno-geeks. Their vision of a world in which atomized individuals use technology and free markets to achieve dominance over others differs in degree, and not kind, from much of the real world today. At a time when many people feel powerless to influence social conditions, their message—don’t worry about society; technology will make you smart, strong, and attractive—could seem compelling.
It may seem foreign and strange right now to wear head mounted displays and want to put impant electronics under our skin now, but I think like theg geeks and the world wide web, transhumanism and cyborganics are going to become more and more accepted as this group of individuals excels beyond others. I will stand tall with my desire to augment myself because the idea of improving myself is compelling, and I believe while the transhumanist movement is young, the work being done now will be the foundations for years to come.
Fusing Chips with Brains
Cyborganics took a big step forward when european researchers were able to fuse electronic chips with brain cells. The reason why they did this was to pave the road towards sophisticated neural prostheses. These prostheses could be used potentially to assist nurological disorders or build more advanced computers using human tissue. Yeah, it sounds a bit like Robocop, but it could mean a great leap in computational power and cyborgs.
To create the neuro-chip, researchers squeezed more than 16,000 electronic transistors and hundreds of capacitors onto a silicon chip just 1 millimeter square in size.
[Researchers] used special proteins found in the brain to glue brain cells, called neurons, onto the chip. However, the proteins acted as more than just a simple adhesive."They also provided the link between ionic channels of the neurons and semiconductor material in a way that neural electrical signals could be passed to the silicon chip," said study team member Stefano Vassanelli from the University of Padua in Italy.
The proteins allowed the neuro-chip's electronic components and its living cells to communicate with each other. Electrical signals from neurons were recorded using the chip's transistors, while the chip's capacitors were used to stimulate the neurons.
They see the payoff being decades away, but for the meantime they believe their work can be used for screening drugs for the pharmaceutical industry. After all researchers follow where the money is, and the pharmaceutical industry has bags of it.
[ Link via Xaos. Thanks Xaos! ]
January 30, 2006
Growing Heart Tissue
Researchers are growing heart tissue to use on damaged hearts.
The tiny pieces of heart tissue beat like a heart, pulsed faster when adrenaline was applied and responded to medicine like a normal organ.Instead of waiting for someone who is a match for your cell type when you have suffered from heart attack, surgeons could take a little bit of your tissue, grow up a heart patch of your own genetic material and put it into your body. It would also save patients from spending the remainder of their lives on medication.
The R&D has a long way to go, but with reports like these, growing body parts seems less and less like science fiction.
[ Link via we make money not art ]
December 15, 2005
Bionic Arm
This bionic arm can do things like picking up fragile items such as a glass, just by the wearer just thinking about it. The arm is connected directly to the wearer, Jesse Sullivan's brain, so he's able to use it like any other appendage. The device weighs 12 pounds, and at this rate, I don't think it will be long to see a 'million dollar man' make headlines.
Electrodes intercept the limb's residual nerve firings and feed them to a computer embedded in the forearm, which then commands six motors to move the device's shoulder, elbow and hand in unison. Thanks to hand sensors, the wearer can even gauge pressure and fine-tune his grip.
[ Link via Davy Kreiger. Thanks David! ]
July 04, 2005
Zap away the Pounds
The technology, by Transneuronix, comprises a matchbox-sized pacemaker implanted into the abdomen, linked to electrodes in the stomach wall.However, it would not work miracles and the user must still eat a healthy diet and do exercise, they cautioned.
The device works by triggering the nerves in the stomach that are involved in digestion.
These tell the brain that the stomach is full so the individual feels as though they have already eaten even though they have not.
[ Link to BBC article via Boing Boing ]