Becoming Batman and Backyard Brains
Saturday afternoon was the official start of the poster presentations and a reminder of how massive this conference is.
Backyard brains: You too can do neurophysiology in your garage- # 20.1
"What would you say if I told you that you could record neuronal spikes for under $100?" As soon as I heard this I knew I was in the presence of Tim Marzullo, co-founder of Backyard Brains. Last year was the unveiling of the "$100 Spike" at SfN Washington, summarized very well in this YouTube video. This year Tim and Greg Gage announced that their SpikerBox bio-technology kit would become available for purchase by December of this year. The duo had an operational SpikerBox broadcasting the APs of the sensory neurons from a cockroach leg. Greg was walking around with his iPhone App for visualizing the spikes on your favorite smart phone. Tim mentioned to me how one of the improvements he hopes to realize in the next few months is a way to make the box so durable that someone could throw it without damage upon impact. In addition to cockroach sensory neurons, Tim gave a demo of how to dissect a cricket to expose the ventral nerve cord. Greg also informed us on how we could purchase 70 electrodes for a cost of $1.20 (sewing needles).
Becoming Batman: Using the life of the Caped Crusader to explore the concepts of exercise, injury and neural plasticity and bring science to the general public- #24.18
I spent some time chatting with researcher and author E. Paul Zehr about his book “Becoming Batman: The Possibility of a Superhero”. In the book, Dr. Zehr takes the well known superhero Batman and uses his physical attributes to explore if a normal person could really transform their neuromuscular properties to heroic levels. During his discussion of his book with a general public he realized how we as researchers can take for granted our knowledge of general physiological concepts. Dr. Zehr also told me how the process of writing this book enabled him to apply a bigger lens to his grant writing and that this assisted in improving his grant writing. Dr. Zehr is working on another book - "Inventing Ironman" - which should be released in late 2010. A funny side note were the stories of emails he has received about people who are willing to pay him to literally train them to become batman!
Recruitment and discharge rate of motor units in the medial gastrocnemius muscle during postural sways- #81.4
Moving to Theme D, I stopped by and had a chat with Mr. Vieira about his work on motor units in the gastrocnemius during sway. In his tasks, the subjects are instructed to stand quitely in an upright position for 70 s. Fine-wire electrodes were used to record discharge times of motor units. The center of pressure was analyzed in a way that revealed when the subject was falling forward to a small degree. Motor units were found to begin discharging a few milliseconds prior to the micro-fall event. The recruitment time was dependent on the location of the motor unit within the muscle (central and distal before proximal). When the motor unit was recruited earlier the duration of the sway was shortened. It was very interesting to see how muscle activity is modulated during postural sway, especially for someone who looks at this activity during voluntary contractions in limb muscles.
- Mike
Backyard brains: You too can do neurophysiology in your garage- # 20.1
"What would you say if I told you that you could record neuronal spikes for under $100?" As soon as I heard this I knew I was in the presence of Tim Marzullo, co-founder of Backyard Brains. Last year was the unveiling of the "$100 Spike" at SfN Washington, summarized very well in this YouTube video. This year Tim and Greg Gage announced that their SpikerBox bio-technology kit would become available for purchase by December of this year. The duo had an operational SpikerBox broadcasting the APs of the sensory neurons from a cockroach leg. Greg was walking around with his iPhone App for visualizing the spikes on your favorite smart phone. Tim mentioned to me how one of the improvements he hopes to realize in the next few months is a way to make the box so durable that someone could throw it without damage upon impact. In addition to cockroach sensory neurons, Tim gave a demo of how to dissect a cricket to expose the ventral nerve cord. Greg also informed us on how we could purchase 70 electrodes for a cost of $1.20 (sewing needles).
Becoming Batman: Using the life of the Caped Crusader to explore the concepts of exercise, injury and neural plasticity and bring science to the general public- #24.18
I spent some time chatting with researcher and author E. Paul Zehr about his book “Becoming Batman: The Possibility of a Superhero”. In the book, Dr. Zehr takes the well known superhero Batman and uses his physical attributes to explore if a normal person could really transform their neuromuscular properties to heroic levels. During his discussion of his book with a general public he realized how we as researchers can take for granted our knowledge of general physiological concepts. Dr. Zehr also told me how the process of writing this book enabled him to apply a bigger lens to his grant writing and that this assisted in improving his grant writing. Dr. Zehr is working on another book - "Inventing Ironman" - which should be released in late 2010. A funny side note were the stories of emails he has received about people who are willing to pay him to literally train them to become batman!
Recruitment and discharge rate of motor units in the medial gastrocnemius muscle during postural sways- #81.4
Moving to Theme D, I stopped by and had a chat with Mr. Vieira about his work on motor units in the gastrocnemius during sway. In his tasks, the subjects are instructed to stand quitely in an upright position for 70 s. Fine-wire electrodes were used to record discharge times of motor units. The center of pressure was analyzed in a way that revealed when the subject was falling forward to a small degree. Motor units were found to begin discharging a few milliseconds prior to the micro-fall event. The recruitment time was dependent on the location of the motor unit within the muscle (central and distal before proximal). When the motor unit was recruited earlier the duration of the sway was shortened. It was very interesting to see how muscle activity is modulated during postural sway, especially for someone who looks at this activity during voluntary contractions in limb muscles.
- Mike
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