Quick Study Of The Maiko’s Furisode Kimono+Undergarments! 

Aerial view of Dún Eoghanachta stone fort, Inis Mór, Aran Islands, Ireland (Bing maps)

Your pocket Constitution

The amazing Khizr Khan was onto something with his pocket U.S. Constitution - and our Labs team went ahead and made an app for that. Understanding the U.S. Constitution is an app that allows you to view the articles and amendments of the Constitution, and then links you to scholarship relating to each specific section. It’s free for iOS and Android. Keep fighting the good fight against “alternative facts.” 

More here: http://labs.jstor.org/constitution/

Southeast Asians on 4/20 be like

Everyone else: SMOKE WEED EVERYDAY

Us: EAT WEED EVERYDAY @useless-indonesiafacts

Don’t play, play - Singlish is studied around the globe

Blogger Wendy Cheng’s Web video series Xiaxue’s Guide To Life and Jack Neo’s Ah Boys To Men film franchise are well-known shows among Singaporeans. For one thing, they are filled with colloquial terms, local references and copious doses of Singlish terms such as “lah” and “lor”.

But they are not merely for entertainment. In recent years, such shows have found a place in universities around the world, where linguists draw on dialogues used in these local productions to introduce to undergraduates and postgraduate students how Singlish has become a unique variety of the English language.

This comes even as concerns have been raised over how Singlish could impede the use of standard English here.

From Italy and Germany to Japan, at least seven universities around the world have used Singlish as a case study in linguistics courses over the past decade. This is on top of more than 40 academics outside of Singapore - some of whom were previously based here - who have written books or papers on Singlish as part of their research.

Harvard has a pigment library that stores old pigment sources, like the ground shells of now-extinct insects, poisonous metals, and wrappings from Egyptian mummies, to preserve the origins of the world’s rarest colors.

A few centuries ago, finding a specific color might have meant trekking across the globe to a mineral deposit in the middle of Afghanistan. “Every pigment has its own story,” Narayan Khandekar, the caretaker of the pigment collection, told Fastcodesign. He also shared the stories of some of the most interesting pigments in the collection.

Mummy Brown

“People would harvest mummies from Egypt and then extract the brown resin material that was on the wrappings around the bodies and turn that into a pigment. It’s a very bizarre kind of pigment, I’ve got to say, but it was very popular in the 18th and 19th centuries.”

Cadmium Yellow

“Cadmium yellow was introduced in the mid 19th century. It’s a bright yellow that many impressionists used. Cadmium is a heavy metal, very toxic. In the early 20th century, cadmium red was introduced. You find these pigments used in industrial processes. Up until the 1970s, Lego bricks had cadmium pigment in them.”

Annatto “The lipstick plant—a small tree, Bixa orellana, native to Central and South America—produces annatto, a natural orange dye. Seeds from the plant are contained in a pod surrounded with a bright red pulp. Currently, annatto is used to color butter, cheese, and cosmetics.”

Lapis Lazuli “People would mine it in Afghanistan, ship it across Europe, and it was more expensive than gold so it would have its own budget line on a commission.”

Dragon’s Blood “It has a great name, but it’s not from dragons. [The bright red pigment] is from the rattan palm.”

Cochineal “This red dye comes from squashed beetles, and it’s used in cosmetics and food.”

Emerald Green “This is made from copper acetoarsenite. We had a Van Gogh with a bright green background that was identified as emerald green. Pigments used for artists’ purposes can find their way into use in other areas as well. Emerald green was used as an insecticide, and you often see it on older wood that would be put into the ground, like railroad ties.”

Source

List of medieval European scientists

Anthemius of Tralles (ca. 474 – ca. 534): a professor of geometry and architecture, authored many influential works on mathematics and was one of the architects of the famed Hagia Sophia, the largest building in the world at its time. His works were among the most important source texts in the Arab world and Western Europe for centuries after.

John Philoponus (ca. 490–ca. 570): also known as John the Grammarian, a Christian Byzantine philosopher, launched a revolution in the understanding of physics by critiquing and correcting the earlier works of Aristotle. In the process he proposed important concepts such as a rudimentary notion of inertia and the invariant acceleration of falling objects. Although his works were repressed at various times in the Byzantine Empire, because of religious controversy, they would nevertheless become important to the understanding of physics throughout Europe and the Arab world.

Paul of Aegina (ca. 625–ca. 690): considered by some to be the greatest Christian Byzantine surgeon, developed many novel surgical techniques and authored the medical encyclopedia Medical Compendium in Seven Books. The book on surgery in particular was the definitive treatise in Europe and the Islamic world for hundreds of years.

The Venerable Bede (ca. 672–735): a Christian monk of the monasteries of Wearmouth and Jarrow who wrote a work On the Nature of Things, several books on the mathematical / astronomical subject of computus, the most influential entitled On the Reckoning of Time. He made original discoveries concerning the nature of the tides and his works on computus became required elements of the training of clergy, and thus greatly influenced early medieval knowledge of the natural world.

Rabanus Maurus (c. 780 – 856): a Christian monk and teacher, later archbishop of Mainz, who wrote a treatise on Computus and the encyclopedic work De universo. His teaching earned him the accolade of "Praeceptor Germaniae," or "the teacher of Germany."

Abbas Ibn Firnas (810 – 887): a polymath and inventor in Muslim Spain, made contributions in a variety of fields and is most known for his contributions to glass-making and aviation. He developed novel ways of manufacturing and using glass. He broke his back at an unsuccessful attempt at flying a primitive hang glider in 875.

Pope Sylvester II (c. 946–1003): a Christian scholar, teacher, mathematician, and later pope, reintroduced the abacus and armillary sphere to Western Europe after they had been lost for centuries following the Greco-Roman era. He was also responsible in part for the spread of the Hindu-Arabic numeral system in Western Europe.

Maslamah al-Majriti (died 1008): a mathematician, astronomer, and chemist in Muslim Spain, made contributions in many areas, from new techniques for surveying to updating and improving the astronomical tables of al-Khwarizmi and inventing a process for producing mercury oxide.[citation needed] He is most famous, though, for having helped transmit knowledge of mathematics and astronomy to Muslim Spain and Christian Western Europe.

Abulcasis (936-1013): a physician and scientist in Muslim Spain, is considered to be the father of modern surgery. He wrote numerous medical texts, developed many innovative surgical instruments, and developed a variety of new surgical techniques and practices. His texts were considered the definitive works on surgery in Europe until the Renaissance.

Constantine the African (c. 1020&–1087): a Christian native of Carthage, is best known for his translating of ancient Greek and Roman medical texts from Arabic into Latin while working at the Schola Medica Salernitana in Salerno, Italy. Among the works he translated were those of Hippocrates and Galen.

Arzachel (1028–1087): the foremost astronomer of the early second millennium, lived in Muslim Spain and greatly expanded the understanding and accuracy of planetary models and terrestrial measurements used for navigation. He developed key technologies including the equatorium and universal latitude-independent astrolabe.

Avempace (died 1138): a famous physicist from Muslim Spain who had an important influence on later physicists such as Galileo. He was the first to theorize the concept of a reaction force for every force exerted.

Adelard of Bath (c. 1080 – c. 1152): was a 12th-century English scholar, known for his work in astronomy, astrology, philosophy and mathematics.

Avenzoar (1091–1161): from Muslim Spain, introduced an experimental method in surgery, employing animal testing in order to experiment with surgical procedures before applying them to human patients.[4] He also performed the earliest dissections and postmortem autopsies on both humans as well as animals.

Robert Grosseteste (1168–1253): Bishop of Lincoln, was the central character of the English intellectual movement in the first half of the 13th century and is considered the founder of scientific thought in Oxford. He had a great interest in the natural world and wrote texts on the mathematical sciences of optics, astronomy and geometry. In his commentaries on Aristotle's scientific works, he affirmed that experiments should be used in order to verify a theory, testing its consequences. Roger Bacon was influenced by his work on optics and astronomy.

Albert the Great (1193–1280): Doctor Universalis, was one of the most prominent representatives of the philosophical tradition emerging from the Dominican Order. He is one of the thirty-three Saints of the Roman Catholic Church honored with the title of Doctor of the Church. He became famous for his vast knowledge and for his defence of the pacific coexistence between science and religion. Albert was an essential figure in introducing Greek and Islamic science into the medieval universities, although not without hesitation with regard to particular Aristotelian theses. In one of his most famous sayings he asserted: "Science does not consist in ratifying what others say, but of searching for the causes of phenomena." Thomas Aquinas was his most famous pupil.

John of Sacrobosco (c. 1195 – c. 1256): was a scholar, monk, and astronomer (probably English, but possibly Irish or Scottish) who taught at the University of Paris and wrote an authoritative and influential mediaeval astronomy text, the Tractatus de Sphaera; the Algorismus, which introduced calculations with Hindu-Arabic numerals into the European university curriculum; the Compotus ecclesiasticis on Easter reckoning; and the Tractatus de quadrante on the construction and use of the astronomical quadrant.

Jordanus de Nemore (late 12th, early 13th century): was one of the major pure mathematicians of the Middle Ages. He wrote treatises on mechanics ("the science of weights"), on basic and advanced arithmetic, on algebra, on geometry, and on the mathematics of stereographic projection.

Villard de Honnecourt (fl. 13th century): a French engineer and architect who made sketches of mechanical devices such as automatons and perhaps drew a picture of an early escapement mechanism for clockworks.

Roger Bacon (1214–94): Doctor Admirabilis, joined the Franciscan Order around 1240 where, influenced by Grosseteste, Alhacen and others, he dedicated himself to studies where he implemented the observation of nature and experimentation as the foundation of natural knowledge. Bacon wrote in such areas as mechanics, astronomy, geography and, most of all, optics. The optical research of Grosseteste and Bacon established optics as an area of study at the medieval university and formed the basis for a continuous tradition of research into optics that went all the way up to the beginning of the 17th century and the foundation of modern optics by Kepler.[8]

Ibn al-Baitar (died 1248): a botanist and pharmacist in Muslim Spain, researched over 1400 types of plants, foods, and drugs and compiled pharmaceutical and medical encyclopedias documenting his research. These were used in the Islamic world and Europe until the 19th century.

Theodoric Borgognoni (1205-1296): was an Italian Dominican friar and Bishop of Cervia who promoted the uses of both antiseptics and anaesthetics in surgery. His written work had a deep impact on Henri de Mondeville, who studied under him while living in Italy and later became the court physician for King Philip IV of France.

William of Saliceto (1210-1277): was an Italian surgeon of Lombardy who advanced medical knowledge and even challenged the work of the renowned Greco-Roman surgeon Galen (129-216 AD) by arguing that allowing pus to form in wounds was detrimental to the health of he patient.

Thomas Aquinas (1227–74): Doctor Angelicus, was an Italian theologian and friar in the Dominican Order. As his mentor Albert the Great, he is a Catholic Saint and Doctor of the Church. In addition to his extensive commentaries on Aristotle's scientific treatises, he was also said to have written an important alchemical treatise titled Aurora Consurgens. However, his most lasting contribution to the scientific development of the period was his role in the incorporation of Aristotelianism into the Scholastic tradition.

Arnaldus de Villa Nova (1235-1313): was an alchemist, astrologer, and physician from the Crown of Aragon who translated various Arabic medical texts, including those of Avicenna, and performed optical experiments with camera obscura.

John Duns Scotus (1266–1308): Doctor Subtilis, was a member of the Franciscan Order, philosopher and theologian. Emerging from the academic environment of the University of Oxford. where the presence of Grosseteste and Bacon was still palpable, he had a different view on the relationship between reason and faith as that of Thomas Aquinas. For Duns Scotus, the truths of faith could not be comprehended through the use of reason. Philosophy, hence, should not be a servant to theology, but act independently. He was the mentor of one of the greatest names of philosophy in the Middle Ages: William of Ockham.

Mondino de Liuzzi (c. 1270-1326): was an Italian physician, surgeon, and anatomist from Bologna who was one of the first in Medieval Europe to advocate for the public dissection of cadavers for advancing the field of anatomy. This followed a long-held Christian ban on dissections performed by the Alexandrian school in the late Roman Empire.

William of Ockham (1285–1350): Doctor Invincibilis, was an English Franciscan friar, philosopher, logician and theologian. Ockham defended the principle of parsimony, which could already be seen in the works of his mentor Duns Scotus. His principle later became known as Occam's Razor and states that if there are various equally valid explanations for a fact, then the simplest one should be chosen. This became a foundation of what would come to be known as the scientific method and one of the pillars of reductionism in science. Ockham probably died of the Black Plague. Jean Buridan and Nicole Oresme were his followers.

Jacopo Dondi dell'Orologio (1290-1359): was an Italian doctor, clockmaker, and astronomer from Padua who wrote on a number of scientific subjects such as pharmacology, surgery, astrology, and natural sciences. He also designed an astronomical clock.

Richard of Wallingford (1292-1336): an English abbot, mathematician, astronomer, and horologist who designed an astronomical clock as well as an equatorium to calculate the lunar, solar and planetary longitudes, as well as predict eclipses.

Jean Buridan (1300–58): was a French philosopher and priest. Although he was one of the most famous and influent philosophers of the late Middle Ages, his work today is not renowned by people other than philosophers and historians. One of his most significant contributions to science was the development of the theory of impetus, that explained the movement of projectiles and objects in free-fall. This theory gave way to the dynamics of Galileo Galilei and for Isaac Newton's famous principle of Inertia.

Guy de Chauliac (1300-1368): was a French physician and surgeon who wrote the Chirurgia magna, a widely read publication throughout medieval Europe that became one of the standard textbooks for medical knowledge for the next three centuries. During the Black Death he clearly distinguished Bubonic Plague and Pneumonic Plague as separate diseases, that they were contagious from person to person, and offered advice such as quarantine to avoid their spread in the population. He also served as the personal physician for three successive popes of the Avignon Papacy.

John Arderne (1307-1392): was an English physician and surgeon who invented his own anesthetic that combined hemlock, henbane, and opium. In his writings, he also described how to properly excise and remove the abscess caused by anal fistula.

Nicole Oresme (c. 1323–82): was one of the most original thinkers of the 14th century. A theologian and bishop of Lisieux, he wrote influential treatises in both Latin and French on mathematics, physics, astronomy, and economics. In addition to these contributions, Oresme strongly opposed astrology and speculated about the possibility of a plurality of worlds.

Giovanni Dondi dell'Orologio (c. 1330-1388): was a clockmaker from Padua, Italy who designed the astarium, an astronomical clock and planetarium that utilized the escapement mechanism that had been recently invented in Europe. He also attempted to describe the mechanics of the solar system with mathematical precision.

A history of note

In 2016 the Bank of England will issue their first polymer (plastic) banknotes. Here’s a brief history of the banknote, from Chinese origins to a worldwide phenomenon.

Paper currency was first used in China as early as AD 1000. It was the Chinese who first printed a value on a piece of paper and persuaded everyone that it was worth what it said it was. The whole modern banking system of paper and credit is built on this one simple act of faith. The Chinese had invented both paper and block printing, and this allowed the printing of paper money.

The Chinese writing along the top of this Ming dynasty banknote reads (from right to left): ‘Da Ming tong xing bao chao’ and translates as ‘Great Ming Circulating Treasure Note’. You can find out more about it here. 

The Ming were the first Chinese dynasty to try to totally replace coins with paper money. After seizing power from the Mongol rulers of China in 1368, the rulers of the Ming dynasty tried to reinstate bronze coins. However, there was not enough metal available for this, and paper money, made of mulberry bark, was produced from 1375. Paper money continued to be issued throughout the Ming dynasty, but inflation quickly eroded its value. The effect of inflation was so devastating that paper money was regarded with suspicion for many years and it was not until the 1850s that paper money was issued again. 

The first banknotes in Europe were issued in Sweden by the Stockholm Banco, set up in 1656 by merchant Johan Palmstruch. It produced its first notes a few years later, in 1661, as an alternative to the huge and inconvenient copper plate money which was then in circulation in Sweden. Though the designs of these early notes were simple, they were carefully printed on handmade paper. They were given official authority by impressions of several seals, including the seal of the bank, and no less than eight handwritten signatures. Johan Palmstruch’s own signature can be seen here at the top of the list, on the left of the note. The Stockholm Banco was a private business, but it had close connections with the Swedish crown and the government. It was very successful at first, but then lent too much money and issued too many notes without proper backing. Palmstruch was blamed for the difficulties and imprisoned for mismanagement. Despite the failure of his bank, he is remembered now for introducing notes which were passed freely as money, just like the banknotes that we use today.

Bills of exchange evolved with the growth of banking in Europe from the 13th century. Paper money like the banknotes we use today was not then part of everyday currency in the West, but bankers and merchants did use written records for settling payments, especially in trade. In their simplest form, bills of exchange were written instructions by one person to an agent, authorising payment to a named individual or firm at a specified future date. They were therefore a convenient way of providing credit or making payments over a distance. In this example, John Emerson in Hamburg has instructed Austin Goodwin, a merchant in Bristol, to pay £380 to Joachim Coldorph in three months’ time. If Coldorph needed money sooner, he might choose to sell the bill to a fourth party at a discounted rate. That buyer would then present the bill for payment in Bristol at the appointed date.

In the mid-19th century, individual banks in the American states issued many different banknotes. This continued during the Civil War (1861–1865), but new paper money issued by the treasuries of the United States in New York and the Confederate States in Richmond reflected the political conflict. In the North, the first public paper money issued under the Constitution of the United States was authorised in July 1861, to finance war with the Confederacy. The back of the notes were printed in green, giving rise to the nickname ‘greenbacks’ for American bills. The colour green was chosen as that colour ink best stuck to the paper. The note shown here is an example of the second issue of 1862. On the front is a portrait of Salmon P Chase, Secretary to the Treasury.

During the First World War (1914–1918) a shortage of coins encouraged towns and regions in several European countries to issue local notes worth small sums. In Germany this Notgeld (‘emergency money’) became popular as a theme for collecting, and by the 1920s these tiny notes were produced in vast numbers with collecting, rather than spending, in mind. Designs on the notes ranged from wartime propaganda to local views or scenes from folklore. This example from the town of Hameln (Hamelin), in bright primary colours, refers to the Pied Piper, the legendary rat catcher who lured the children of the town to their deaths in the 13th century. A whole sequence of notes was issued, each one illustrating a different part of the tale.

The issuing of the £5 polymer banknote, which will bear the portrait of Sir Winston Churchill, means that England joins the growing number of countries who already use polymer technology. The durability and increased security afforded by the plastic notes have made them an attractive proposition to issuing authorities throughout the world from Australia and Nigeria to Brazil and Canada. This image shows a sheet of 32 uncut polymer banknotes printed for Clydesdale Bank in Scotland in 2015.

Discover the history of money in the British Museum’s Citi Money Gallery (Room 68), supported by Citi.

Fairyland, or, Through the Enchanted Forest.

[Gloucester, England], [Roberts Brothers], [ca. 1890-1915].

Bryn Mawr College Special Collections GV1469.F221 T4 1890z

This whimsical board game, with its blinding powder, cabbage, meat, and cake tokens, has it all! Wild two-headed animals ravage the forest and hapless children must make it through armed only with odd grocery items! The game is a new addition to the Bryn Mawr College Special Collections as part of the Ellery Yale Wood Collection of Children’s Books.

Can the brain feel it? The world’s smallest extracellular needle-electrodes

A research team in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Information Engineering and the Electronics-Inspired Interdisciplinary Research Institute (EIIRIS) at Toyohashi University of Technology developed 5-μm-diameter needle-electrodes on 1 mm × 1 mm block modules. This tiny needle may help solve the mysteries of the brain and facilitate the development of a brain-machine interface. The research results were reported in Scientific Reports on Oct 25, 2016.

(Image caption: Extracellular needle-electrode with a diameter of 5 μm mounted on a connector)

The neuron networks in the human brain are extremely complex. Microfabricated silicon needle-electrode devices were expected to be an innovation that would be able to record and analyze the electrical activities of the microscale neuronal circuits in the brain.

However, smaller needle technologies (e.g., needle diameter < 10 μm) are necessary to reduce damage to brain tissue. In addition to the needle geometry, the device substrate should be minimized not only to reduce the total amount of damage to tissue but also to enhance the accessibility of the electrode in the brain. Thus, these electrode technologies will realize new experimental neurophysiological concepts.

A research team in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Information Engineering and the EIIRIS at Toyohashi University of Technology developed 5- μm-diameter needle-electrodes on 1 mm × 1 mm block modules.

The individual microneedles are fabricated on the block modules, which are small enough to use in the narrow spaces present in brain tissue; as demonstrated in the recording using mouse cerebrum cortices. In addition, the block module remarkably improves the design variability in the packaging, offering numerous in vivo recording applications.

“We demonstrated the high design variability in the packaging of our electrode device, and in vivo neuronal recordings were performed by simply placing the device on a mouse’s brain. We were very surprised that high quality signals of a single unit were stably recorded over a long period using the 5-μm-diameter needle,” explained the first author, Assistant Professor Hirohito Sawahata, and co-author, researcher Shota Yamagiwa.

The leader of the research team, Associate Professor Takeshi Kawano said: “Our silicon needle technology offers low invasive neuronal recordings and provides novel methodologies for electrophysiology; therefore, it has the potential to enhance experimental neuroscience.” He added, “We expect the development of applications to solve the mysteries of the brain and the development of brain–machine interfaces.”

(Image caption: This type of electrocorticography (ECoG) grid, which is implanted in patients about to undergo epilepsy surgery, enables researchers to record and transmit electrical signals to and from the surface of the brain. Credit: Mark Stone/University of Washington)

For the first time in humans, researchers use brain surface stimulation to provide ‘touch’ feedback to direct movement

In the quest to restore movement to people with spinal cord injuries, researchers have focused on getting brain signals to disconnected nerves and muscles that no longer receive messages that would spur them to move.

But grasping a cup or brushing hair or cooking a meal requires other feedback that has been lost in amputees and individuals with paralysis — a sense of touch. The brain needs information from a fingertip or limb or external device to understand how firmly a person is gripping or how much pressure is needed to perform everyday tasks.

Now, University of Washington researchers at the National Science Foundation Center for Sensorimotor Neural Engineering (CSNE) have used direct stimulation of the human brain surface to provide basic sensory feedback through artificial electrical signals, enabling a patient to control movement while performing a simple task: opening and closing his hand.

It’s a first step towards developing “closed loop,” bi-directional brain-computer interfaces (BBCIs) that enable two-way communication between parts of the nervous system. They would also allow the brain to directly control external prosthetics or other devices that can enhance movement — or even reanimate a paralyzed limb — while getting sensory feedback.

The results of this research will be published in the Oct.-Dec. 2016 issue of IEEE Transactions on Haptics. An early-access version of the paper is available online.

“We were able to provide a baseline degree of sensory feedback by direct cortical stimulation of the brain,” said lead author and UW bioengineering doctoral student Jeneva Cronin. “To our knowledge this is the first time it’s been done in a human patient who was awake and performing a motor task that depended on that feedback.”

The team of bioengineers, computer scientists and medical researchers from the CSNE and UW’s GRIDLab used electrical signals of different current intensities, dictated by the position of the patient’s hand measured by a glove he wore, to stimulate the patient’s brain that had been implanted with electrocorticographic (ECoG) electrodes. The patient then used those artificial signals delivered to the brain to “sense” how the researchers wanted him to move his hand.

“The question is: Can humans use novel electrical sensations that they’ve never felt before, perceive them at different levels and use this to do a task? And the answer seems to be yes,” said co-author and UW bioengineering doctoral student James Wu. “Whether this type of sensation can be as diverse as the textures and feelings that we can sense tactilely is an open question.”

They would also allow the brain to directly control external prosthetics or other devices that can enhance movement — or even reanimate a paralyzed limb — while getting sensory feedback.

It’s difficult for a person to mimic natural movements — whether using a prosthetic device or a limb that has become disconnected from the brain by neurological injury — without sensation. Though there are devices to assist patients with paralysis or who have undergone amputations with basic function, being able to feel again ranks highly on their priorities, researchers said.

Restoring this sensory feedback requires developing an “artificial” language of electrical signals that the brain can interpret as sensation and incorporate as useful feedback when performing a task.

The UW CSNE team frequently works with patients about to undergo epilepsy surgery who have recently had an ECoG electrode grid implanted on the surface of their brain. For several days or weeks, doctors constantly monitor their brain activity to pinpoint the origin of their seizures before operating.

By consenting to participate in research studies during this period when their brain is “wired,” these patients enable researchers to answer basic neurological questions. They can test which parts of the brain are activated during different behaviors, what happens when a certain region of the brain’s cortex is stimulated and even how to induce brain plasticity to promote rehabilitation and healing across damaged areas.

The potential to use ECoG electrodes implanted on the surface of the brain in future prosthetic or rehabilitative applications offers several advantages — the signals are stronger and more accurate than sensors placed on the scalp, but less invasive than ones that penetrate the brain, as in a recent study by University of Pittsburgh researchers.

In the UW study, three patients wore a glove embedded with sensors that provided data about where their fingers and joints were positioned. They were asked to stay within a target position somewhere between having their hands open and closed without being able to see what that target position was. The only feedback they received about the target hand position was artificial electrical data delivered by the research team.

When their hands opened too far, they received no electrical stimulus to the brain. When their hand was too closed – similar to squeezing something too hard – the electrical stimuli was provided at a higher intensity.

One patient was able to achieve accuracies in reaching the target position well above chance when receiving the electrical feedback. Performance dropped when the patient received random signals regardless of hand position, suggesting that the subject had been using the artificial sensory feedback to control hand movement.

Providing that artificial sensory feedback in a way that the brain can understand is key to developing prosthetics, implants or other neural devices that could restore a sense of position, touch or feeling in patients where that connection has been severed.

“Right now we’re using very primitive kinds of codes where we’re changing only frequency or intensity of the stimulation, but eventually it might be more like a symphony,” said co-author Rajesh Rao, CSNE director and UW professor of computer science & engineering.

“That’s what you’d need to do to have a very natural grip for tasks such as preparing a dish in the kitchen. When you want to pick up the salt shaker and all your ingredients, you need to exert just the right amount of pressure. Any day-to-day task like opening a cupboard or lifting a plate or breaking an egg requires this complex sensory feedback.”