Ed Boyden: A light switch for neurons
http://www.ted.com Ed Boyden shows how, by inserting genes for light-sensitive proteins into brain cells, he can selectively activate or de-activate specific neurons with fiber-optic implants....
==========
Think about your day for a second. You woke up, felt fresh air on your face as you walked out the door, encountered new colleagues and had great discussions, and felt in awe when you found something new. But I bet there's something you didn't think about today -- something so close to home that you probably don't think about it very often at all. And that's that all the sensations, feelings, decisions and actions are mediated by the computer in your head called the brain. Now the brain may not look like much from the outside -- a couple pounds of pinkish-gray flesh, amorphous -- but the last hundred years of neuroscience have allowed us to zoom in on the brain, and to see the intricacy of what lies within. And they've told us t...
==========
Think about your day for a second. You woke up, felt fresh air on your face as you walked out the door, encountered new colleagues and had great discussions, and felt in awe when you found something new. But I bet there's something you didn't think about today -- something so close to home that you probably don't think about it very often at all. And that's that all the sensations, feelings, decisions and actions are mediated by the computer in your head called the brain. Now the brain may not look like much from the outside -- a couple pounds of pinkish-gray flesh, amorphous -- but the last hundred years of neuroscience have allowed us to zoom in on the brain, and to see the intricacy of what lies within. And they've told us t...
