Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) posted at 7:45 am on Sat, Nov 09, 2024:
Germany’s Bundestag has passed a controversial motion equating criticism of Israel with antisemitism. Dozens of Jewish academics opposed the resolution, saying it will endanger Jewish Germans by associating them with the actions of the Israeli government.
https://t.co/cbkFD7jSb0
(https://x.com/AJEnglish/status/1855154607963750650?t=7Z_Z6XBI7ZYBCFl4ADzdQQ&s=03)
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KanekoaTheGreat
@KanekoaTheGreat
8th November 2024
Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) posted at 9:03 pm on Thu, Nov 07, 2024:
Sweden decides to cancel all planned offshore wind power projects in the Baltic Sea due to the military threat from Russia’s Kaliningrad
Sweden’s military said the wind turbines can interfere with radar & sensors used to detect threats above & below the surface from Kaliningrad
https://t.co/abBJrK5nUI
(https://x.com/visegrad24/status/1854630752484573585?t=c_gTAYVTn9m83K8hZsX7wQ&s=03)
FeaturedNeuroscienceVisual Neuroscience
·November 7, 2024
Summary: A new study reveals how the brain compensates for rapid eye movements, maintaining a stable visual perception despite dynamic visual input. Researchers found that this stability mechanism breaks down for non-rigid motion like rotating vortices, leading to visual instability.
Eye-tracking tests showed that rapid eye movements, or saccades, couldn’t track these complex motions, challenging established visual processing models. This discovery underscores that smooth and rapid eye movements follow different neural pathways.
These findings can refine cognitive and neurodegenerative disorder research. The study offers a fresh view on vision stability and the brain’s motion perception processes.
Key Facts:
Source: University of Munster
The visual perception of optical stimuli demands high performance from the brain.
Every second, the eyes absorb more than ten million pieces of information and transmit them to the brain via thousands of nerve fibres. This leads us to perceive the world as stable, even though we are constantly moving our eyes.
Experts suspect that this is made possible by a special compensation mechanism of the visual system, which has been studied for a long time but is still not understood.
A research team led by psychologist Prof Markus Lappe from the University of Münster has investigated how this stable perception of the world arises from a highly dynamic visual input signal on the retina.
They focussed on the motion perception of non-rigid objects such as fire or water, which is virtually unexplored.
The researchers found that, contrary to previous assumptions, smooth eye movements (smooth pursuit) cannot be performed for all types of visual motion.
In addition, they were able to demonstrate for the first time that the compensation mechanism for rapid eye movements (saccades) is overridden when we see certain types of non-rigid movements.
As a result, visual stability is lost. The results of the study have been published in the journal ‘Science Advances’.
‘Our results show a clear separation of the two systems. They are functionally distinct and run along different neuronal pathways,’ explains Markus Lappe.
In the study, the scientists presented a newly discovered visual motion illusion that leads to a disruption of spatial perception. In order to test the new stimulus concept, fifteen subjects had to follow a simulated rotating vortex with their eyes as it moved across a field of dots.
‘Normally this is an easy task, and the eyes remain fixed on the object. Thus, they move continuously at the speed of the object. However, the vortex could not be followed, so the eyes remained static for a period of time,’ explains PhD student Krischan Alexander Koerfer.
A phase of rapid eye movement occurred approximately every 400 milliseconds, which brought the vortex back to the centre of the retina. Each time the subjects made such an eye movement, the vortex seemed to jump forward.
‘The usual compensatory mechanism for rapid eye movements failed when the vortex moved. Although the resulting movement was clearly perceived, the eye could not follow it. This is a previously unknown combination.’
Methodology:
The research team examined the relationship between the presented physical stimuli and the corresponding perception, such as perceived jumps, while precisely measuring the eye position and eye movements synchronously using high-speed infrared cameras, so-called ‘eye trackers’.
In this process, the eyes are illuminated with infrared light and the reflections on the cornea and pupil are filmed and analysed. The reflections allow the exact position and movement of the eyes to be determined.
The new findings from basic research are particularly useful for cognitive and brain research.
‘The fact that for the first time a movement is presented in which the compensation mechanism fails means that old models can be tested and new ones developed,’ says Markus Lappe.
In the long term, the new stimulus concept can also be used to diagnose and research neurodegenerative diseases.
Author: Kathrin Kottke
Source: University of Munster
Contact: Kathrin Kottke – University of Munster
Image: The image is credited to Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access.
“Inability to pursue nonrigid motion produces instability of spatial perception” by Markus Lappe et al. Science Advances
Abstract
Inability to pursue nonrigid motion produces instability of spatial perception
Vision generates a stable representation of space by combining retinal input with internal predictions about the visual consequences of eye movements. We report a type of nonrigid motion that disrupts the connection between eye movements and perception, causing visual instability.
This motion is accurately perceived during fixation, but it cannot be pursued. Catch-up saccades are accurately directed to the moving target but the motion stimulus appears to jump in space with each saccade.
Our results reveal four major findings about perception and the visuomotor system: (i) Pursuit fails for certain types of motion; (ii) pursuit and catch-up saccades are independently controlled; (iii) prediction of saccade consequences is independent from saccade control; and (iv) the visual stability of moving objects relies on similar motion mechanisms as pursuit.
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brain researcheye movementneurobiologyNeuroscienceUniversity of Münstervisionvisual neuroscience
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Neuroscience News posts science research news from labs, universities, hospitals and news departments around the world. Science articles cover neuroscience, psychology, AI, robotics, neurology, brain cancer, mental health, machine learning, autism, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, brain research, depression and other sciences.
The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) posted at 11:18 am on Fri, Nov 08, 2024:
“Studying psychology and coming into contact with psychotherapy supplied me with the belief that we live in a world where many points of view co-exist.”
Literature laureate Olga Tokarczuk took a break from writing while at university to study clinical psychology. While volunteering at psychiatric hospitals in Poland, she observed individuals facing significant challenges in managing their well-being amidst a time of crisis and social upheaval. In her biography she wrote, “I thought these people needed my help more than I needed to write.” Tokarczuk will join us at Nobel Week Dialogue on 9 December for a discussion regarding the increase of mental illness in a post-pandemic world. Learn more about this event: https://bit.ly/48bUGRT
https://t.co/uBNNB5IXCC
(https://x.com/NobelPrize/status/1854845846937805275?t=od46BQwEQol7K_SY73ka2g&s=03)
8th November 2024
Nothing to add. Says it all. Wonder will any member of our outgoing government or our President uphold European values & join with Dutch government in condemning last night’s attacks?
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(((Katharina von Schnurbein)))
@kschnurbein
8th November 2024
Horrified and shocked by the attacks in Amsterdam on #Makkabi football fans last night, reminiscent of Europe’s dark days just as we prepare to remember #Pogrom Night of 1938. Trusting the Dutch authorities will investigate, prosecute and reestablish security for Jews people.
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November 07, 2024
The compounds we exhale when we breathe could be the key to spotting cancer early
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Researchers have developed a nanoscale sensor that detects lung cancer simply by analyzing the levels of a chemical called isoprene in your breath. The team believes its breakthrough could unlock a non-invasive, low-cost method to catch the disease early, and potentially save a lot of lives.
The challenge with spotting biomarkers in breath is that your system needs to be able to differentiate between volatile chemicals, withstand the natural humidity of exhaled breath, and detect tiny quantities of specific chemicals. In the case of isoprene, you’d need sensors capable of detecting levels of the chemical in the parts-per-billion (ppb) range.
The researchers went to work refining indium oxide-based nanoflake sensors that would meet these criteria. Following several experiments, they arrived at a metal oxide-based sensor type containing platinum (Pt), indium (In), and nickel (Ni).
This type of material, which they called Pt@InNiOx, displayed ultrasensitivity and detected isoprene levels as low as two ppb. It also responded to isoprene more than other compounds found in human breath, and performed consistently through their tests.
Those tests involved incorporating the Pt@InNiOx nanoflakes into a portable device, which they used with breath samples from 13 participants – five of whom had lung cancer. The sensing device detected isoprene levels lower than 40 ppb in samples from participants with cancer, and more than 60 ppb from cancer-free participants.
That could spell greater chances of spotting lung cancer earlier, more easily and a far lower cost than traditional methods – many of which are typically applied only when patients show concerning symptoms. The World Health Organization noted in 2020 that lung cancer claimed 1.8 million lives around the globe, and early detection using methods like this could go a long way towards preventing them.
It’s worth noting that the researchers’ paper, published in the journal ACS Sensors, captured the results of a rather small test group. The team noted that there’s more work to be done before this screening method can become commercially available: researching the sensing materials, further data analysis, integrating the technology into portable devices, and investigating the relationship between breath isoprene and lung cancer more deeply.
Other projects involving breath-based cancer diagnostics have been in the works for a few years now. Cancer Research UK embarked on a study back in 2019, but it doesn’t appear to have published results yet. Hopefully this new screening method will be able to stick the landing, and pave the way for more breath analysis research in the future.
Source: American Chemical Society
CancerCancerLung cancerLungBreathalyzerZhejiang University
Abhimanyu has been a trusted voice in the science, technology, transport innovations, startup and AI spaces for more than a decade at several global outlets, including three and a half years as the managing editor at TNW. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics, Psychology and Sociology. When he’s not writing about breakthroughs in science and tech, he’s usually out motorcycling around South India.
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Academia and some “think tanks” are the origin of the extinctionist mind viruses
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Gad Saad
@GadSaad
7th November 2024
Every single dreadful parasitic idea that is destroying the West stems from academia. It begins there but then these ideas escape the Ivory Tower and parasitize everything. @realDonaldTrump’s victory on Tuesday is good news in that the majority of decent people reject this nonsense BUT the battle won’t be won until all of these ideas are permanently eradicated along with the reflex for suicidal empathy. Hence, the current victory is great but step 1 of a very long process of de-lobotomizing all of academia and its offshoot intelligentsia.
