Researchers wirelessly record human brain activity during normal life activities

This project, published in the journal Nature Biotechnology, was funded by the National Institutes of Health’s Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiative.

“This is really the first example of wirelessly recording deep and surface human brain activity for an extended period of time in the participants’ home environment,” said Kari Ashmont, Ph.D., project manager for the NIH BRAIN Initiative. “It is also the first demonstration of adaptive deep brain stimulation at home.”

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) devices are approved by the U. S. Food and Drug Administration for the management of Parkinson’s disease symptoms by implanting a thin wire, or electrode, that sends electrical signals into the brain. In 2018, the laboratory of Philip Starr, M.D., Ph.D. at the University of California, San Francisco, developed an adaptive version of DBS that adapts its stimulation only when needed based on recorded brain activity. In this study, Dr. Starr and his colleagues made several additional improvements to the implanted technology.

“This is the first device that allows for continuous and direct wireless recording of the entire brain signal over many hours,” said Dr. Starr. “That means we are able to perform whole brain recording over a long period of time while people are going about their daily lives.”

The implications of this type of recording are significant. The brain activity patterns (neural signatures) normally used to identify problems such as Parkinson’s disease symptoms have traditionally been recorded in clinical settings over short periods of time. This new technology makes it possible to validate those signatures during ordinary daily activities.  

“If you ever hope to use in-hospital recordings to modify a disease state through adaptive stimulation, you must show that they are also valid in the real world,” said Dr. Starr.   

Another advantage to recording over long periods of time is that distinct changes in brain activity (biomarkers) that could predict movement disorders can now be identified for individual patients. Ro’ee Gilron, Ph.D., a postdoctoral scholar in Dr. Starr’s lab and first author of this study, explained that this allows for a level of customized DBS treatment that was impossible to achieve previously.

“Because we are able to build a biomarker library for each patient, we can now program each DBS unit according to a patient’s individual needs,” said Dr. Gilron. “This includes personalized stimulation programs that adapt as the patient’s needs change throughout the day.”

NASA-Built Instrument Will Help Spot Greenhouse Gas Super-Emitters

“JPL is excited to be pioneering this research effort, which will provide critical information about greenhouse gases and the future of Earth’s climate,” said James Graf, director for the Earth Science and Technology Directorate at JPL. “This effort is the first time we have partnered on a space mission with a consortium of nonprofit organizations, universities, and the State of California.”

The first Carbon Mapper satellite is targeting a 2023 launch. JPL will provide a state-of-the-art imaging spectrometer, a type of instrument used widely in scientific research. Where a digital photograph breaks down visible light into just three colors – red, green, and blue – an imaging spectrometer breaks down light into hundreds of colors to reveal the unique spectral signatures of molecules such as methane and carbon dioxide in the air.

JPL has been developing imaging spectrometers since the 1980s for NASA, and its instruments have unmatched performance. In the last few years, the laboratory has used these imagers deployed on airplanes to measure atmospheric gases, including methane in California and the Four Corners region of the U.S. JPL imaging spectrometers will also be aboard upcoming missions to the Moon and Jupiter’s moon Europa.

The Carbon Mapper’s Earth-orbiting imaging spectrometer will have a pixel size of about 30 meters (98 feet) square. Other imaging spectrometers currently in orbit have larger pixel sizes, making it hard to pinpoint the locations of sources that may not be visible on the ground, such as cracks in natural gas pipelines. “With such high-resolution images, there is no question where greenhouse gas plumes originate. This technology enables researchers to identify, study, and quantify the strong gas emission sources,” said JPL scientist Charles Miller, who has spent decades studying methane around the world.

JPL’s research in methane quantification from spectroscopy, funded by NASA’s Earth science division, is also helping Carbon Mapper to address a second challenge: making its data on emissions accessible to all interested users in industry, government, and the private sector. Carbon Mapper will have an open data portal making its findings available quickly and continuously, speeding disaster responses and the repair of faulty industrial equipment.

“This decade represents an all-hands-on-deck moment for humanity to make critical progress in addressing climate change,” said Riley Duren, Carbon Mapper’s chief executive officer and a research scientist at the University of Arizona in Tucson. “Our mission is to help fill gaps in the emerging global ecosystem of methane and CO₂ monitoring systems by delivering data that are timely, actionable and accessible for science-based decision making.”

Prototype app for mobile devices could screen children at risk for autism spectrum disorder

The findings suggest that the app could one day screen infants and toddlers for ASD and refer them for early intervention, when chances for treatment success are greatest.

The study appears in JAMA Pediatrics and was conducted by Geraldine Dawson, Ph.D., director of the NIH Autism Center of Excellence at Duke University, and colleagues. Funding was provided by NIH’s Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and National Institute of Mental Health.

Studies have found that the human brain is hard-wired for social cues, with a person’s gaze automatically focusing on social signals. In ASD, attention to social stimuli is reduced, and researchers have sought to screen for ASD in young children by tracking their eye movements while they view social stimuli. However, equipment used for visual tracking is expensive and requires specially trained personnel, limiting its use outside of laboratory settings.

The current study enrolled 933 toddlers ages 16 to 38 months during a well-child primary care visit. Of these children, 40 were later diagnosed with ASD. They viewed on a mobile device short videos of people smiling and making eye contact or engaging in conversation. Researchers recorded the children’s gaze patterns with the device’s camera and measured them using computer vision and machine learning analysis. Children with ASD were much less likely than typically developing children to focus on social cues and visually track the conversations in the videos.

Pending confirmation by larger studies, the authors concluded that this eye-tracking app featuring specially designed videos and computer vision analysis could be a viable method for identifying young children with ASD.

Energy Unleashed by Volcanic Eruptions Deep in Our Oceans Could Power All of the United States

Eruptions from deep-sea volcanoes were long-thought to be relatively uninteresting compared with those on land. While terrestrial volcanoes often produce spectacular eruptions, dispersing volcanic ash into the environment, it was thought that deep marine eruptions only produced slow moving lava flows.

But data gathered by remotely operated vehicles deep in the North East Pacific and analyzed by scientists at the University of Leeds, has revealed a link between the way ash is dispersed during submarine eruptions and the creation of large and powerful columns of heated water rising from the ocean floor, known as megaplumes.

These megaplumes contain hot chemical-rich water and act in the same way as the atmospheric plumes seen from land-based volcanoes, spreading first upwards and then outwards, carrying volcanic ash with them. The size of megaplumes is immense, with the volumes of water equivalent to forty million Olympic-sized swimming pools. They have been detected above various submarine volcanoes but their origin has remained unknown. The results of this new research show that they form rapidly during the eruption of lava.

The research was carried out by Sam Pegler, from the School of Mathematics and David Ferguson, from the School of Earth and Environment and is being published today (April 21, 2021) in the journal Nature Communications.

Together they developed a mathematical model which shows how ash from these submarine eruptions spreads several kilometers from the volcano. They used the ash pattern deposited by a historic submarine eruption to reconstruct its dynamics. This showed that the rate of energy released and required to carry ash to the observed distances is extremely high — equivalent to the power used by the whole of the USA.

David Ferguson said: “The majority of Earth’s volcanic activity occurs underwater, mostly at depths of several kilometers in the deep ocean but, in contrast to terrestrial volcanoes, even detecting that an eruption has occurred on the seafloor is extremely challenging. Consequently, there remains much for scientists to learn about submarine volcanism and its effects on the marine environment.”

The research shows that submarine eruptions cause megaplumes to form but the release of energy is so rapid that it cannot be supplied from the erupted molten lava alone. Instead, the research concludes that submarine volcanic eruptions lead to the rapid emptying of reservoirs of hot fluids within the earth’s crust. As the magma forces its way upwards towards the seafloor, it drives this hot fluid with it.

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Story credit: University of Leeds

Mars Helicopter Flight Delayed to No Earlier than April 14

During a high-speed spin test of the rotors on Friday, the command sequence controlling the test ended early due to a “watchdog” timer expiration. This occurred as it was trying to transition the flight computer from ‘Pre-Flight’ to ‘Flight’ mode. The helicopter is safe and healthy and communicated its full telemetry set to Earth.

The watchdog timer oversees the command sequence and alerts the system to any potential issues. It helps the system stay safe by not proceeding if an issue is observed and worked as planned.

The helicopter team is reviewing telemetry to diagnose and understand the issue. Following that, they will reschedule the full-speed test.

DOE Investing $128 Million Toward Cutting Solar Costs 60% by 2030

On March 25, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) shared that it has set a new goal of cutting the cost of solar energy by 60% by 2030 and that it is putting $128 million toward lowering costs, improving performance, and accelerating the development of technologies used. 

U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm noted that solar is already cheaper than coal and other fossil fuels in many parts of the country. She added that the new funding will help bring more affordable clean energy to the national power grid, create jobs, and put the U.S. on track to accomplish the Biden-Harris administration’s goal of having the U.S. powered by 100% clean energy by 2035.

The new solar energy cost reduction target is 5 years earlier than the DOE’s previous goal. Currently, the average U.S. solar kilowatt-hour costs 4.6 cents, and the 60% reduction goal would bring that cost down to 3 cents/kWh by 2025 and 2 cents/kWh by 2030.

The DOE said that by 2035, traditional solar panels could provide between 30% and 50% of the U.S. electricity supply. The new funding will support innovative advancements in perovskites and cadmium telluride — two key materials used to produce solar cells. 

Here’s a breakdown of where that $128 million in funding will go:

• $40 million will be devoted to advancing perovskite research and development
• $20 million will support the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in advancing cheaper cadmium telluride thin-film solar technologies
• $3 million will form the Perovskite Startup Prize — a new competition aimed to speed entrepreneurs’ path to commercializing perovskite technologies
• $33 million is devoted to the advancement of projects in concentrating solar-thermal power (CSP), which captures heat from sunlight and converts it to energy that spins turbines or powers engines
• $25 million will be utilized to demonstrate a next-generation CSP power plant, built by Sandia National Laboratories.

Additionally, the DOE has made $7 million available for projects that would increase the lifespan of silicon-based photovoltaic systems from their current 30 years to 50 years, which would lower the cost of energy and cut down on waste.

Image Credit: Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

Story credit: Thomas Insights 

NASA Joins White House National Climate Task Force

The administration’s climate agenda outlines putting climate at the center of the country’s foreign policy and national security and encourages a governmentwide approach to climate change.

From the launch of the first weather satellite in 1960, the Television and Infrared Observation Satellite (TIROS-1), NASA has used the vantage of space to study Earth. It remains the only space agency in the world providing end-to-end research on the Blue Planet to analyze and understand the processes involved.

“Climate change is one of the most pressing issues facing us today,” said Gavin Schmidt, acting NASA senior climate advisor and director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York. “Given our unique ability to observe the planet from space and the long-term data records we’ve been able to assemble, NASA is in a prime position to inform policy decisions in the current administration and beyond.”

Working together with our government partners, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the United States Geological Survey, NASA is responsible for building the country’s Earth-observing assets in civil space. More than two dozen NASA satellites measure the height of oceans and inland waters, clouds and precipitation, soil moisture, carbon dioxide, and more. The data collected helps to improve weather forecasts, inform farming practices, and helps decision makers at all levels of government and the private sector.

Beyond Earth-observing satellites, NASA is developing predictive modeling technologies to examine policy-specific scenarios and conducting research that contributes to governmentwide sustainability efforts and understanding of climate change. To reduce the environmental impacts of aviation, NASA is conducting research for energy efficient aircraft that employ technologies such as lightweight structures, transformative aerodynamics, and hybrid-electric propulsion.

Through its long-term observations of Earth, providing insight into how the planet is changing, efforts to contribute to sustainable aviation and nurturing partnerships with the private sector, NASA already is poised to help the task force address the most pressing climate change issues today.