moritherapy/science

A review of an interesting book about neuroscience. From the page: "The Brain That Changes Itself: Stores of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science, is a compelling collection of tales about the amazing abilities of the brain to rewire, readjust and relearn after having a slice of itself rendered dysfunctional. The first seven chapters captivated me for their personal stories; the final four chapters for the science and philosophy."

Malcolm Gladwell of "Blink" and "Tipping Point" fame has a blog! Yay!!!

Interesting - but too spooky for my taste. "In a few years you might have a pill to help you forget your bad breakup just the way Jim Carey did in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. With a high dose of just one enzyme, scientists can now erase very specific memories while you're in the act of recalling them. The enzyme known as CaMKII is linked to learning and memory, and Georgia neuroscientist Joe Z. Tsien and his team used it to induce extremely targeted memory-erasure in mice. Tsien thinks the process might help humans lay traumatic memories to rest."

I came here from an article I justed thumbed up, "10 things the food industry doesn't want you to know." This paragraph led me to the present article, which I couldn't thumb down because I'm the first to stumble it:

"10. The food industry works aggressively to discredit its critics.
According to the new JAMA article, the Center for Consumer Freedom boasts that "[our strategy] is to shoot the messenger. We've got to attack [activists'] credibility as spokespersons." Here's the group's entry on Marion Nestle."

"A new species of blind, subterranean, predatory ant discovered in the Amazon rainforest by University of Texas at Austin evolutionary biologist Christian Rabeling is likely a descendant of the very first ants to evolve."

From the page: "Shortly after physicists activated the Collider on Wednesday, hackers identifying themselves as Group 2600 of the Greek Security Team accessed computers connected to the Compact Muon Solenoid detector, one of four key subsystems responsible for monitoring the collisions of protons speeding around the 18-mile track near Geneva, Switzerland.

A few scientists had worried that the experiment could inadvertently create a planet-swallowing black hole. Physicists called this impossible, or at least extraordinarily unlikely. But the hack raises a different sort of worst-case scenario: the largest and most complicated science experiment in history, intended to reveal basic information about the composition of matter, derailed by malevolent intruders.

"The LHC experiments have very complex computer systems for data recording and analysis and even more sensitive systems for experiment control, trigger and data acquisition," said MIT physicist and Collider collaborator Frank Taylor. "You could imagine that penetrating the 'real time domain' could have catastrophic consequences."

Electrons have something in common with people: the more information they acquire about their setting, the more they become aware of their individuality and the more belonging to a group loses its importance. As a result, the coherent harmony that binds the electrons into a fixed relationship with their environment is lost. This is what scientists at the Fritz-Haber Institute of the Max-Planck Society discovered when, with the aid of X-rays, they catapulted electrons out of molecules consisting of two nitrogen atoms.