Scientists make monkeys smarter using brain implants. We are the next?

For the very first time, scientists have demonstrated that a brain implant can improve thinking ability in primates. By implanting an electrode array into the cerebral cortex of monkeys, researchers were able to restore — and even improve — their decision-making abilities. The implications for possible therapies are far-reaching, including potential treatments for cognitive disorders and brain injuries.

But there's also the possibility that this could lead to implants that could boost your intelligence. Here's how they did it.

Mapping minds

Researchers from Wake Forest Baptist Medical Centre, University of Kentucky, and University of Southern California took five rhesus monkeys and trained them on a delayed match-to-sample task. This involved tracking images of toys, a person, and a mountain range that were flashing on a large screen. Following a delay, the monkeys had to select the same image on the screen from a group of one to seven images. The monkeys were trained to work on this task for the past two years, and they managed to acquire a proficiency of around 75%.

The researchers, a team led by Sam Deadwyler and Robert Hampson, then monitored the brain activity of the monkeys to confirm the location of the areas required for decision making. They paid particular attention to those areas that lit up when the monkeys were successful at the matching game.

To do so, they used a tiny probe with two sensors that was threaded through the monkeys' forehead and into their cerebral cortex (specifically between two cortical layers of the brain), thus allowing them to record activity in the prefrontal cortex.

Bring on the coke

Once they were satisfied that the correct mapping had been done, they administered cocaine to the monkeys to impair their performance on the match-to-sample task (seems like a rather severe drug to administer, but there you have it). Immediately, the monkeys' performance fell by a factor of 20%.

It was at this point that the researchers engaged the neural device. Specifically, they deployed a "multi-input multi-output nonlinear" (MIMO) model to stimulate the neurons that the monkeys needed to complete the task. The inputs of this device monitored such things as blood flow, temperature, and the electrical activity of other neurons, while the outputs triggered the individual neurons required for decision making. Taken together, the i/o model was able to predict the output of the cortical neurons — and in turn deliver electrical stimulation to the right neurons at the right time.

Uplift happens

And incredibly, it worked. The researchers successfully restored the monkeys' decision-making skills even though they were still dealing with the effects of the cocaine. Moreover, when duplicating the experiment under normal conditions, the monkeys' performance improved beyond the 75% proficiency level shown earlier. In other words, a kind of cognitive enhancement had happened.

The researchers hope to apply their findings to treating brain injuries or diseases where larger areas of the brain have been affected (such as dementia or stroke). The researchers are confident that their technology could be contained on an implantable chip.

Looking ahead to the future, and assuming safety and ongoing efficacy, it may even be possible to apply a similar intervention to healthy humans. Which could lead to prosthetically enabled intelligence augmentation.

Their results were published in the Journal of Neural Engineering.

The most amazing battery in the world can't charge anything

Batteries of the future

Good morrow, weary traveller. You've come from far and wide in search of the best smartphone round up, and sadly, you have failed to find it.
This will have to do.

Bewildered by batteries

Oh, those clever scientists. We've all lamented the lack of a decent smartphone battery for years, but some intelligent bods in the US have worked out a way to use aluminium-ion power packs, combined with graphite cathodes, to charge a smartphone in a minute.

Imagine that: being able to just plug in, go make a cup of tea, and before it's even finished be back to full juice. And guess what's better? These things are flexible, so can be used to power fully bendable devices! 'TIS TRULY THE FUTURE, PEOPLE!
Except, well, they don't actually function as batteries yet. They still need a lot of development. Which is massively frustrating as I've been here so many times before, witnessing the possibilities of the future before finding out it will be years and years before it arrives in our hands.
What we need isn't better and clever battery tech - it's more efficient processors. Better development of the technology we have in batteries now, and manufacturers to stop trying to make phones ever thinner with hyper high-res screens when we don't need them. Then we can all get the battery life we all crave.

HTC gives China the best toys

And a quick plea to HTC: PLEASE CAN WE HAVE THE GOOD PHONE? The HTC One M9+ has launched for China only, but comes with a massive QHD screen, high power Duo Camera and 480fps super slow motion camera.
I know this is slightly hypocritical given I've just said we don't need all the cutting edge technology when it saps power, but there's something that irks when a flagship phone like the One M9 goes on sale, then a much better option lands in China... and it will never see Western shores.

The redemption

It had been three days now, and without any food Winston was starting to worry. Stumbling away from the built up metropolis he found himself on the outskirts of a vast forest.
"There's something familiar about this..." he thought, before nearly being knocked to the ground by a massive owl.
"HOW DARE YOU RETURN!" screamed the feathered assailant, landing awkwardly on a nearby branch. "You left us. You left this place. We were alone with nothing to help us."
Winston felt confused. He felt like this owl was familiar, and yet he didn't know why. Like a nasty dream that dredged up during the day while making lunch. Then suddenly his vision was filled with all manner of information.
:>IDENTIFIED: HOOTIE THE OWL.
:>RELATIONSHIP: MASSIVE PAIN THE ASS
:>ACTION: TELL HIM TO **** OFF
Winston staggered back, his head spinning from this sudden information dump. He ran into the woods, each tree looking more familiar, every branch a spindly set of fingers trying to reach into his memory. Then his world began to spin - literally, as he fell down a ditch.
Winston lay at the bottom, a small readout telling him that he had superficial damage to quadrants 3 to 7. He let his head fall back, panting, before something caught his eye. Buried underneath a pile of leaves was a small dusty grey object.
Was... was that an HTC HD2?
"Welcome back, young warrior," said a voice to his right. He turned to look, seeing a small marmoset with a hood. "Many of us believed you would return, and the Book of Palms said you would be enhanced.
"It will please the council that it was right," said the small rodent with a smirk. "Come now, we are sure you have many questions. Your training awaits."

Peter Chou and the HTC rock song

It would be easy to label this video as another example of a company getting too over excited and trying to be rock stars because they made a shiny thing.
And, to a degree, there is a modicum of wanting to hide behind your fingers and peep out at this, as the guys on stage (including now-ex-CEO Peter Chou and new CEO Cher Wang, along with other key members of the HTC team) are obviously not natural musicians.
I really can't get the chorus out of my head. *holds up lighter*
YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1o8UiAcR3Fg

Press shot of the week

Let's break this press shot for the LG Ice Cream down critically.
More than one model to display a sense that loads of people want this phone? Yep.
Do they look like they're forced to be there? Actually, no. The eyes show a little bit of life behind them. The woman on the left is smiling like she's just remembered she packed an amazing lunch today, while the one on the right is giving it the full smiling guns as she's on a first written warning for skipping work last week to tend to her cabbage patch.
Are they wearing attire appropriate to the launch? Yes. Furry hats and ear muffs say 'brrrrr, we're cold. Because of all the Ice Cream that's going on around us. LG Ice Cream!'
Even though it's clearly boiling in that cafe.
A smattering of props that overtly tell the viewer what LG is up to? Yep. There's an ice cream cone, impressively double-stacked, and a plate of scoops for those that don't like to eat the wafer.
Points lost for a lack of flake though.

Retro video of the week

THIS VIDEO IS TOO SHORT. I genuinely want to hear that song re-done as a proper jungle / drum 'n' bass track. The dancing ladies are optional.
Also, I don't think I've ever heard anyone say anything as panicked as 'Keanu! Call me, call me on my mobile!'
YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__lipPAL64U

Science Fiction Technologies That Actually exists.

Jonathan recently visited Dragon Con 2014 – a huge Atlanta convention catering to fans of science fiction, fantasy, comic books, horror and video games! At Dragon Con there is no short supply of cosplayers bringing their science fiction fantasies to life. Which led us to thinking, what sci-fi technologies already exist in the REAL world?

Which science fiction idea do you think is the next one to become reality? Let us know your thoughts and explain your answer in the comments below!

Courtsey:

FW: Thinking

Are Invisibility Cloaks On The Way? -youtube

Scientists and engineers are working on REAL ways to make objects invisible. So how far are we from getting our own Harry Potter invisibility cloak? From optical camouflage to metamaterials, researchers are developing technologies that could make your greatest science fiction fantasies a reality!

What instance of invisibility cloak technology in fiction is your favorite? Let us know in the comments below!

Courtsey: FW: Thinking

Are you aware? If not, must see this video.

Technology has been always crucial to the development of fashion, but as technology improves and advances, it is being more and more closely integrated into our clothing.

Wearable technologies currently exist in two spaces - as conceptual pieces by artisan designers, and as engineering driven wearable products that are taken to market. But, as Danielle Wilde explains, the future for wearable technologies lies in creating products with expressive aesthetic qualities that can be taken to market.

Danielle Wilde is a visiting research Fellow, Centre for Smart Materials and Performance Textiles at RMIT University.

This video is a co-production between SBS World News and The Conversation.

One of the Biggest Mistakes Enterprise Startups Make

The era of VCs investing in successful consumer Internet startups such as eBay led to a belief system that seemed to permeate many enterprise software startups that hiring sales or implementation people was a bad thing.
“We want low-touch or zero-touch businesses” was the mantra.

I believe it’s flawed.

While I have some sympathy with not investing too heavily in sales people until the product has properly been tested and commercialized in the enterprise environment, in the end it’s a fact that it takes sales people to move product through large organizations. And of course the most successful technology companies: Google, Facebook, Salesforce.com [duh], Oracle, Microsoft all have loads of sales people.

But the “no sales people” mantra isn’t what I’m here to take on. It’s the second belief system that is even more engrained and even more wrong. Many young startups are being advised not to have a professional services business and in my opinion, this is a big mistake.
The line of reasoning goes, “Services businesses are not scalable and the market won’t reward this revenue so make sure that third-parties do your implementation or clients do it themselves. We only want software revenue.”
This is a huge mistake. If you’re an early-stage enterprise startup services revenue is exactly what you need.
Let me explain why:
1. Successful Implementations
The most important way to sell a product for an early-stage business (or frankly any stage) is to have strong referenceable customers. These are the lifeblood of your sales organization. Referenceable means they are willing to be part of your sales collateral, willing to take calls from key leads, willing to speak at your conferences, etc.
How do you get referenceable customers? You build a great product and make sure it is used in such a way as to deliver real benefit to your customers versus just the promise of a benefit outlined in your marketing materials.
As much as many non-experienced investors might like to believe, even great products don’t just roll themselves out. You need to implement them. This often means getting the product to talk with other existing products, implementing the product to match the specific needs of a customer’s internal processes, training, monitoring usage and encouraging adoption.
It also means creating communication plans to make sure that there is a senior sponsor in the organization who knows what the benefits are, as well as measuring and communicating the gains.
This is vital because every rollout needs a champion (the person in charge of rollout) and a sponsor (the senior person who has the budget and who stops the blockers from killing the project). And that’s just it – every project has blockers. The people who either want to do nothing or who prefer a different solution.
Your project is forked without a rollout organization, communications, measurement, integration and without turning sales into referenceable customers.
Trust me – this will NOT happen without a dedication implementation team.
Professional services = higher rate of successful rollouts.
2. System Integrations
As outlined above, one of the most important things to get an implementation right is integration. Your system as a silo will not deliver the same impact as your system talking with your customers other systems. And you can’t use the API argument to get out of helping with integration. As in, “Well, as a tech firm we put tons of effort into APIs so that you can do your own integrations. We prefer to sell software, not get involved with client systems.”
This line of thinking is expressed to me all the time by startup companies that think it is a pain to have to actually work with enterprise accounts. They prefer to just “innovate” and not have the grubby work of actually making their innovation work with real customers.
Good luck with that.
Your customers will not dedicate the teams to build the integrations because they are not yet committed enough to your product or company. This will happen organically in the future but not until you’re already large and successful.
And the other thing: The more your product is integrated with other systems, the lower your churn rate will be. Imagine when your competitor comes in with their new whiz-bang features. Your customer sees it and thinks, “I wish your product did that” and you respond that you will have that feature launched in three months. But knowing that your competitor can’t get the integration done by then and your customer doesn’t want to go through the hassle of doing another integration – guess what – you will have a safe haven at that account.
Professional services + systems integration = lower churn.
3. Channel Partners Not Yet Formed
I’ve heard many investors / advisors tell startups to have third-parties do the implementations rather than doing it themselves. “You’re a software company not a services company! We like software. Software gooood. Services baaaad. Just have third-party VARs & SI’s do the implementations.”
Politely listen but ignore them.
Why would you have your most important success factor (successful implementations) outsourced to a third-party where you don’t control quality and who is strictly mercenary (i.e. doesn’t care as much about the successful outcomes as I do). I highly recommend this strategy for any company who doesn’t care about referenceable customers.
Here’s the thing: until your sales volume is sufficiently large, no self-respecting SI or VAR is going to commit resources to making you successful. By definition you will either get a crappy SI promising you they will move mountains or a great SI that gives you their C-player team. Think about it – why should a great SI with tons of work commit to you while you’re still a small company?

I wrote about that extensively in “the fallacy of channel partners.” When you’re bigger, channels play a very important role. But while you’re early? You need to control the sale and the implementation.
I call the argument many investors try to make on this point the “Salesforce.com argument” and it’s bogus.
People often cite Salesforce.com, “They don’t do their own implementations! They have a third-party ecosystem. And they’re the best enterprise company out there so they must know something.”
I worked at Salesforce.com. I can tell you this argument is wrong. Salesforce did have their own professional services / implementation team. Salesforce’s success as a company early on was because their earliest customers DID have success and Salesforce put a lot of energy into making that happen.
Only after Salesforce.com went public did they consider cutting back on professional services because Wall Street didn’t reward the lower-margin business as much as the software business. But Salesforce knew how important this process is to their success so they actively encouraged the development of an ecosystem so much so that they even invested in these third-parties to make sure they were well-enough financed to survive.
Don’t fall for the Salesforce.com argument from your investors. It’s false logic.
Professional services = higher quality implementation.
4. Your Best Eyes & Ears
What did I learn from nearly a decade of doing system integration projects at Accenture early in my career? Your most successful sales people are the people who are on the ground doing the implementations.
But they’re technology people not sales people!
Precisely.
They know your customers’ systems. They are trusted by your customers exactly because they are tech people handling the rollout and making magic happen. They know your product intimately. And they form meaningful, trusted relationships with your customers.
So when your relationship-sales rep wants to figure out how to get a broader rollout of your product (more seats!) or how to sell new modules to those customers or how to get the CEO to be a referenceable customer for you, look no further than your implementation team to help this rep get the orders they need.
They are the gateway to your growth.
Professional services = upsell + cross sale + new business units
5. It’s Profitable Revenue Covering Your Fixed Costs
And finally, the most obvious argument is an economic one.
It’s true that professional services have a lower margin (say 45-55% gross margin) than software (typically 85-95% gross margin) and professional services business are inherently less scalable.
So I’m not endorsing your building your entire company around professional services (although I think that’s a fine strategy for many non VC-backed companies) but rather not to avoid it.
Let’s say you can do $1 million in software sales in your first year of selling delivering $850,000 of gross margin. Let’s say you can supplement that with $1 million in professional services revenue at $500,000 gross margin.
Need I point out that the $500,000 is still profitable revenue that can contribute to your central costs of running your business?
That it is non-dilutive financing?
That it is the driver of your future software revenue for next year?
Professional services = profitable revenue streams that fuel your business continuity.
The key is to not become overly reliant on professional services. There are some clear do’s and don’ts for how to layer professional services into a software business.
And I’ll address those in my next post.
Until then, happy implementations.
[Photo: Flickr/KatanaZ]
Courtsey: techcrunch.com

Old again, with the tech.

When you watch the technology industry long enough, you begin to see some of the same ideas recycled. Maybe they didn’t catch on the first time because they were too early, or maybe someone out there today believes they’re smarter or can throw more money at the problem and succeed where others couldn’t.

Technology tends to run in cycles, and as it evolves some early failed attempts might be worth another look in the context of more modern infrastructure. In several instances lately, whether streaming video or meal delivery, everything old has become new again.
Courtsey: techcrunch.com

New “Tandem” Solar Cell to Harnesses More Sunlight

Test sample of a monolithic perovskite-silicon multijunction solar cell produced by the MIT-Stanford University team.

By combining two types of photovoltaic material, researchers from MIT and Stanford have developed a new “tandem” solar cell that harnesses more sunlight.
Researchers at MIT and Stanford University have developed a new kind of solar cell that combines two different layers of sunlight-absorbing material in order to harvest a broader range of the sun’s energy. The development could lead to photovoltaic cells that are more efficient than those currently used in solar-power installations, the researchers say.
The new cell uses a layer of silicon — which forms the basis for most of today’s solar panels — but adds a semi-transparent layer of a material called perovskite, which can absorb higher-energy particles of light. Unlike an earlier “tandem” solar cell reported by members of the same team earlier this year — in which the two layers were physically stacked, but each had its own separate electrical connections — the new version has both layers connected together as a single device that needs only one control circuit.
The new findings are reported in the journal Applied Physics Letters by MIT graduate student Jonathan Mailoa; associate professor of mechanical engineering Tonio Buonassisi; Colin Bailie and Michael McGehee at Stanford; and four others.
“Different layers absorb different portions of the sunlight,” Mailoa explains. In the earlier tandem solar cell, the two layers of photovoltaic material could be operated independently of each other and required their own wiring and control circuits, allowing each cell to be tuned independently for optimal performance.
By contrast, the new combined version should be much simpler to make and install, Mailoa says. “It has advantages in terms of simplicity, because it looks and operates just like a single silicon cell,” he says, with only a single electrical control circuit needed.
One tradeoff is that the current produced is limited by the capacity of the lesser of the two layers. Electrical current, Buonassisi explains, can be thought of as analogous to the volume of water passing through a pipe, which is limited by the diameter of the pipe: If you connect two lengths of pipe of different diameters, one after the other, “the amount of water is limited by the narrowest pipe,” he says. Combining two solar cell layers in series has the same limiting effect on current.
To address that limitation, the team aims to match the current output of the two layers as precisely as possible. In this proof-of-concept solar cell, this means the total power output is about the same as that of conventional solar cells; the team is now working to optimize that output.
Perovskites have been studied for potential electronic uses including solar cells, but this is the first time they have been successfully paired with silicon cells in this configuration, a feat that posed numerous technical challenges. Now the team is focusing on increasing the power efficiency — the percentage of sunlight’s energy that gets converted to electricity — that is possible from the combined cell. In this initial version, the efficiency is 13.7 percent, but the researchers say they have identified low-cost ways of improving this to about 30 percent — a substantial improvement over today’s commercial silicon-based solar cells — and they say this technology could ultimately achieve a power efficiency of more than 35 percent.
They will also explore how to easily manufacture the new type of device, but Buonassisi says that should be relatively straightforward, since the materials lend themselves to being made through methods very similar to conventional silicon-cell manufacturing.
One hurdle is making the material durable enough to be commercially viable: The perovskite material degrades quickly in open air, so it either needs to be modified to improve its inherent durability or encapsulated to prevent exposure to air — without adding significantly to manufacturing costs and without degrading performance.
This exact formulation may not turn out to be the most advantageous for better solar cells, Buonassisi says, but is one of several pathways worth exploring. “Our job at this point is to provide options to the world,” he says. “The market will select among them.”
“I think this work is very significant,” says Martin Green, a professor at the University of New South Wales, in Australia, who was not connected with this research. “The work is important in establishing a proof-of-concept and will stimulate higher efficiencies with this approach. … It’s an excellent starting point for further work in this area.”
The research team also included Eric Johlin PhD ’14 and postdoc Austin Akey at MIT, and Eric Hoke and William Nguyen of Stanford. It was supported by the Bay Area Photovoltaic Consortium and the U.S. Department of Energy.
Publication: Jonathan P. Mailoa, et al., “A 2-terminal perovskite/silicon multijunction solar cell enabled by a silicon tunnel junction,” Appl. Phys. Lett. 106, 121105 (2015); doi:10.1063/1.4914179

It is a dream or what? Really? Microsoft becoming open source

Windows 10 is closed for now, but an open-source version apparently isn't out of the question

The impossible is actually possible at Microsoft, one of the company's engineers claims.
Speaking at the open-source-focused ChefCon this week, Microsoft engineer and Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich said something unheard of: "it's definitely possible" that Windows could eventually go open source.
"It's a new Microsoft," Russinovich said, according to Wired, which was in attendance at the event.
In the world of operating systems, there are two main types: closed source and open source. Closed operating systems include Windows and Apple's OS X and they're categorized as such because the code that's used to drive the software is not made available to the public. Open source, on other hand, means the technology community has access to all the underlying code that drives a piece of software, allowing coders to tinker with it, modify it and ultimately create unique distributions of the operating system. The chief open-source OS on the desktop side is Linux.
The debate over open-source applications has been a long and heated one. Those who support the open-source community argue that by allowing code to be available to users, the prevailing wisdom of those who access the code will create a stronger, more-appealing platform. In the case of Microsoft, however, controlling the code and not making it public is a competitive advantage that has generated billions of dollars for the software giant.
Microsoft making Windows open source would mean a seismic shift at the company. Windows code has been hallowed ground since Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer were running the company and had no interest in anyone fiddling around beneath the operating system's hood. Having a closed platform meant controlling releases, controlling user experiences and ultimately controlling the revenue cycle generated from Windows.
But during the last year, since Microsoft's Satya Nadella has taken over as chief executive, Microsoft has started to slowly but surely change its tack. The company is no longer just a software firm, and Nadella, in a long manifesto last year, said Microsoft would focus on cloud services and mobile and become more platform-agnostic. His goal is to drive revenue and success through services like Office 365, the company's cloud-based suite of applications, including Word and Excel, and target people through services, regardless of the operating system they're on.
Later this year, Microsoft plans to launch Windows 10, the latest update to its long-dominant operating system. For the first time, the company is offering a major update for free to all customers running Windows 7 and Windows 8. The company has even gone so far as to offer a free upgrade to anyone that has pirated a previous copy of Windows. The move was a not-so-subtle attempt by Microsoft to prove it's a changed company that doesn't believe its future hinges on the success or failure of Windows.
Despite Microsoft's potential change in tone toward Windows, the company has not officially made any stance on going open source, and according to Wired, Russinovich said that any move to the open side shouldn't be expected anytime soon. Russinovich conceded, however, that the conversations have occurred and continue to occur.
Such conversations might have gotten people removed from Microsoft a decade ago. Indeed, in the heyday of the reigns of both Gates and Ballmer, merely suggesting that open source was a viable option would have put the person in direct conflict with the fabric of Microsoft's corporate culture.
''Open source is an intellectual-property destroyer,'' former Windows chief Jim Allchin famously quipped in 2001. ''I can't imagine something that could be worse than this for the software business and the intellectual-property business.''
"Linux is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual-property sense to everything it touches," former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer told the Chicago Sun-Times a few months later. "That's the way that the license works."
But times, they are a-changing. Microsoft last year made its .Net framework open source. The .Net framework was built by the company to allow developers to build apps for Windows. Now they can use it for developing apps on other platforms. Microsoft's Azure, a cloud-computing platform that includes everything from a service that will run Web apps to virtual machines running on the Web, also supports Linux. According to a report last year, at least 20 percent of those machines are running Linux and not Windows.
"We have not made any open-source policy or business model changes for Windows," a Microsoft spokeswoman said in a statement.

Courtsey: cnet.com