From: Dan S [dan@southeast.net]
Sent: Saturday, December 12, 1998 5:11 PM
To: isml; exploration@egroups.com
Subject: [isml] Scientists grow brain cells on a microchip
Electronic Telegraph
Monday 27 October 1997
Scientists grow brain cells on a microchip
By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
BRAIN cells have been grown on a microchip to create a simple "brain" to study how the real thing works and how easy it will be to connect computers to the human nervous system.
The work, reported yesterday to the New Orleans conference, is part of an effort to merge the world's two dominant forms of information processing: the neurons that your brain is using to read this sentence and electronics.
In the wake of pioneering work conducted in Germany by Prof Peter Fromherz, Dr Michael Maher of the University of California, San Diego, told the meeting that he had developed the "neurochip", a device for growing rat neurons in a silicon chip that could one day help to restore vision, reconnect nerves or control an artificial limb.
The neurochip has electrodes set inside small wells etched into the silicon. Individual brain cells are placed into each cage, growing extensions called neurites that make contact with neighbouring neurons.
The chips must be kept sterile. "Infection with bacteria and fungus is a constant danger," Dr Maher said. "The cells are bathed in tissue culture medium which was specifically designed - not by us - to maintain survival of brain cells. The neurons survive two to five weeks. We are working to improve that but it is long enough to do the experiments we have planned."
The electrodes in the chip are capable of detecting the electrical activity
of the cell. Dr Maher said: "We can monitor the network. We can also stimulate
input by selectively stimulating any cell in the
network."
The team has done a series of experiments to perfect the design of the chip, and to show that it works. "That is, we have shown that cells survive in the chip and that we can communicate with the neurons in the chip," Dr Maher said. The team plans to study the electrical activity rippling across these gardens of neurons to see how the brain processes and stores information.
dan@southeast.net
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