Brain power: This representation shows the connectivity of the 10,000 neurons and 30 million connections that make up a single neocortical column. (The different colors correspond to different levels of electrical activity.) Having created a biologically accurate computer model of a neocortical column scientists are now planning to model the entire human brain within just 10 years.
BBP/EPFL
A computer simulation could eventually allow neuroscience to be carried out in silico.
An ambitious project to create an accurate computer model of the brain has reached an impressive milestone. Scientists in Switzerland working with IBM researchers have shown that their computer simulation of the neocortical column, arguably the most complex part of a mammal's brain, appears to behave like its biological counterpart. By demonstrating that their simulation is realistic, the researchers say, these results suggest that an entire mammal brain could be completely modeled within three years, and a human brain within the next decade.
"What we're doing is reverse-engineering the brain," says Henry Markram, codirector of the Brain Mind Institute at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, in Switzerland, who led the work, called the Blue Brain project, which began in 2005. (See "IBM: The Computer Brain.") By mimicking the behavior of the brain down to the individual neuron, the researchers aim to create a modeling tool that can be used by neuroscientists to run experiments, test hypotheses, and analyze the effects of drugs more efficiently than they could using real brain tissue.
The model of part of the brain was completed last year, says Markram. But now, after extensive testing comparing its behavior with results from biological experiments, he is satisfied that the simulation is accurate enough that the researchers can proceed with the rest of the brain.
"It's amazing work," says Thomas Serre, a computational-neuroscience researcher at MIT. "This is likely to have a tremendous impact on neuroscience."
The project began with the initial goal of modeling the 10,000 neurons and 30 million synaptic connections that make up a rat's neocortical column, the main building block of a mammal's cortex. The neocortical column was chosen as a starting point because it is widely recognized as being particularly complex, with a heterogeneous structure consisting of many different types of synapse and ion channels. "There's no point in dreaming about modeling the brain if you can't model a small part of it," says Markram.
The model itself is based on 15 years' worth of experimental data on neuronal morphology, gene expression, ion channels, synaptic connectivity, and electrophysiological recordings of the neocortical columns of rats. Software tools were then developed to process this information and automatically reconstruct physiologically accurate 3-D models of neurons and their interconnections.
Connect the dots: A representation of a mammalian neocortical column, the basic building block of the cortex. The representation shows the complexity of this part of the brain, which has now been modeled using a supercomputer.
Credit: BBP/EPFL
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Looks like fuzzy science to me...
Big deal. I found one of those in my clothes dryer screen yesterday.
Sounds cool but what are its practical applications besides drug-testing? Or in other words, can this brain 'think'? Can we make truly sentient beings?
Esoteric Initiation of Digital Brain will save Earth from nuclear war
It'll be very promising to try to combine outlined in this paper approach to digital modeling of the brain with developed by (East) Indian leader of Oneness Movement Bhagavan technique of Enlightenment, whose essence is dissolving the confines of human Ego.
Bhagavan himself (who had received University education in India) claims that the procedure of Enlightenment is based on Brain Science approaches and represents (quite successful - as was confirmed by Bhagavan's extensive practice: there exist around the Globe millions of his followers)an attempt to influence Mind via The Brain.
(As the process of Enlightenment Initiation, or Deeksha, is described [eg, in the book "Deeksha" by Kiara Windrider; 2006], it looks as if Bhagavan [or his specially prepared assistants] are "inputing" into the Initiatee's subtle body, - via Crown Chakram, - a "golden Ball" which is actually a specially programmed "intelligent subtle plane meme"; - which is accomplishing due rearranging of Initiatee's nervous system, adjusting to its special individual features.
"Computer conversion" of Deeksha's technique will allow to make this procedure, - relieving the level of personal stress & caused by it aggressiveness, - easily accessible to each [or at least many enough to form desired by Bhagavan "critical mass of morphogenetic fields"] human person on the planet.
This is of especial importance today, when the threat of total Nuclear Armageddon begins to loom again because of aggressive moves of Putin's Russia, plagued by excessive aggressiveness of its driven by nationalistic ambitions elite.
NEUROMANCER137 SWEDEN
Re: Esoteric Initiation of Digital Brain will save Earth from nuclear war
I think that described in this article technology has immensely great defence potential.
In '80s in Russia were serially produced "pocket-sized psychotronic generators" of "Genotron" type; - into which were built-in "synergetic models" (that is, "skeleton patterns" - of the type used in generation of computer avatars)of rhythmic systems of human heart & the brain (of course, incomparably more crude than those developed in Lausanne).
However, influencing, - by a strong pulse of ultrasonic and/or microwave radiation, directed at a vulnerable bifurcation points of these rhythms' "strange attractors", - human organisms, it was possible (which was extensively confirmed by "field practice" of KGB & GRU agents, which "stealth liquidated" in '80 a number of "Star Wars' project" research personnel in such way which didn't evoke any suspicion from Western security organs) to disrupt functioning of heart and/or brain of selected "human target"; - producing regulated effects ranging from mild confusion to lethal outcome.
Use of sophisticated brain models developed in Lausanne will help to upgrade greatly the spectrum of possibilities of brain influencing of "remote human VIP targets"; - for example, teleporting into their brains (using now well-known technique of "non-local mass quantum states' transference", elaborated by Dr Zeilinger in Austria, Dr Polzik in Denmark & other researchers) non-perceivable by consciousness but irrecusable orders to erase selectively any targeted thought: eg, the desire to press "nuclear button".
(In this way can be justified wise precept of ancient Chinese strategist Sun-Tzu, who wrote that "the best kind of victory is when enemy's plans are destroyed"; - and destruction of aggressive enemy's plans by "non-local quantum erasure" is of the most perfect & artistically elegant kind possible.
Cf. also well-known saying of British military theoretician B. Liddell-Hart who wrote that "the prime target of any battle is the BRAIN of enemy's Commander-in-Chief"; - so why not to make a "logical short-cut", bypassing use of clumsy & largely inefficient "military junk" - influencing directly "enemy leader's brain"?
Theory of "non-local quantum influencing" says that such "quantum weapon" cannot miss: its "non-local missiles" will hit squarely intended target, possessing its own unique "morphic signature", which can be exactly determined, for example, through analysis of "human target"'s DNA.)
If all potential participants in foreseeable in near future nuclear confrontation between East & West will be armed with such "ultimate Peace Weapons" then danger of global nuclear holocaust will be forever banished.
(In this believe not very numerous but dedicated participants of Russian Peace Movement: see, for example, an essay by Vadim Emelyanov "Stop the War" [through telepathically influencing leaders of nuclear nations] at: www.zhurnal.lib.ru/e/emeljanow_w_j/oct.shtml )
Because of aboveindicated military relevance of research of BLUE BRAIN project it might be expected also that it could attract unwelcome interest of various intelligence agencies (if, of course, their representatives weren't in this project from the start).
rusjedi
neocortex as mutually inhibiting neurons
Attached is the project that should dominate the efforts of all brain institutes.
Looking over your research projects I do not observe a project that takes what is known of the brain structure and function and derives logically what matters and what is missing of that structure and function which would permit the full real-time simulation of a the neo-cortex which would model the observed human intellect. It is quite obvious that the neo-cortex with 80 percent excitatory neurons and 20 percent inhibitory neurons needs more details on how the two types of neurons relate. It is also obvious that no one will be able to measure the missing connections strengths between those neurons.
As a result I have been seeking the missing structure and function for many years, actually since my high school days. While teaching graduates at Purdue in the Electrical Engineering Department, I spent three years trying to get neurons to do normalized cross-correlations since as an electricalengineer; I know that un-normalized correlations are generally worthless
in producing useful pattern recognition behavior. Yet neurons perform correlations as their basic function. Finally, I hit on the solution.
By assuming that the basic net of neurons of interest, is a group of excitatory neurons made mutually inhibiting by the interaction with an
inhibitory neuron, I found that the neuron that would fire in the group was the one whose input axonal connection pattern best matched the axonal
input pattern to the group. This behavior required that the correlations performed by the excitatory neurons be normalized. This was accomplishedby the fact that the inhibitory neuron's connection feeding back to each excitatory neuron grew proportional to the square root of the sum of the squares of the excitatory connections. The PSP in the excitatory neuron
thus was proportional to the normalized correlation.
The fact that neurons organized in mutually inhibiting groups are able to perform normalized correlations producing useful pattern recognition behavior is not just a coincidence, but a property of great importance
and probably of basic utility to the neo-cortex. It makes the neo-cortexable to exhibit conditioned reflex behavior with stable and automatic learning ability. In essence the cortex is doing no more than conditioning sensory sub-patterns to produce each other. With layer feed back, this conditioning includes producing short term multi-stable memory states as well.
I have attached a technical document on the neo-cortex structure and function that I have deduced are involved. (not attached in this comment, however). This document is intended to define a brain simulator project intended to build a full brain simulator that would operate in real-time and model 30 billion neurons. The simulator consists of up to 1024 small circuit boards that fit into a volume 2 feet on a side. In a few
years this design would shrink to fit in less than a cubic foot of volume and would cost less than 100,000 dollars. The applications for the simulator are enormous, permitting super robot soldiers, non human slave labor, and workers
of varying intellect including intellects superior to that of the human.
Laws will be needed to protect and regulate these intellectual machines.
The point to all of this is that your brain institute is not attempting to define and build a full brain simulator as a means to unravel the structureand properties of the human brain. Rather it is playing around, experimenting
and measuring whatever, without seeking the important properties of the neo-cortex that make it constructible as a device. Whatever is known of the brain must be used to build a corresponding simulator which is continuously modified as one seeks the correct properties, until the properties are foundthat produces human intellectual behavior. Only by simulating can one
converge on an understanding of the human brain and what matters to produce human intellectual behavior.
I have spent over 40 years seeking and developing the simulator proposed in the attached technical document. I propose a project as outlined in that
document which should be the center of the attention of a brain research institute as yours. I have been seeking funding for such a project on my own and am close to obtaining those funds. It would be advantageous to place such a project in a community of neurologist as in your institute.
Please have some of your best researchers study my technical document and offer any advice they have. Although I derived the mutually inhibiting
normalized behavior over 40 years ago, I believe no one has recognized the importance of my
findings and maybe no one has even read my two publications of those theoretical results.
Sincerely
Dr. Ronald J. Swallow
610 704 0914 (cell)
ronswallow@ptd.net
no one seames to be willing to admitt that thought is much more than a simple electrical event. For example look at the effect of mind altering drugs. A realistic module must be able to reproduce the effect that 100's of thousands of protines and emyzines interacting with each other, the nurones, the cell's abillity to create other chemicales. plus the reginal and global spread of these compounds, and their life cycle
Yes i understand that many modlers say that such behind the sceans activity is uninportant because the effect these systems on the electrial activity can be modeled without having to be able to understand how they come about. My responce is how do you explane persitance, as in memery and problem sloving, this is clearly not an electrical function.
P.S. no. a spell checker dose not work when your spelling is not good enough for it to find the correct spelling and you can not pick the right word without seeing the defination
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Monsterboy
92 Comments
Nice visualization.
The brain as a Jackson Pollack painting. Cool.
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