Forget regular AI. How about a conspiracy of robots fueled by lab grown synthetic human brain tissue?

[OakFieldAlienz444]

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Researchers fuse lab-grown human brain tissue with electronics​

Story by Will Shanklin • 13h


In a story ripped from the opening scenes of a sci-fi horror movie, scientists have bridged a critical gap between the biological and electronic. The study, published in Nature Electronics (summarized in Nature), details a “hybrid biocomputer” combining lab-grown human brain tissue with conventional circuits and AI. Dubbed Brainoware, the system learned to identify voices with 78 percent accuracy. It could one day lead to silicon microchips fused with neurons.

Brainoware combines brain organoids — stem-cell-derived clusters of human cells morphed into neuron-filled “mini-brains” — with conventional electronic circuits. To make it, researchers placed “a single organoid onto a plate containing thousands of electrodes to connect the brain to electric circuits.” The circuits, speaking to the brain organoid, “translate the information they want to input into a pattern of electric pulses.”

The brain tissue then learns and communicates with the technology. A sensor in the electronic array detects the mini-brain’s response, which a trained machine-learning algorithm decodes. In other words, with the help of AI, the neurons and electronics merge into a single (extremely basic, for now) problem-solving biomachine.

The researchers taught the computer-brain system to recognize human voices. They trained Brainoware on 240 recordings of eight people speaking, “translating the audio into electric to deliver to the organoid.” The organic part reacted differently to each voice while generating a pattern of neural activity AI learned to understand. Brainoware learned to identify the voices with 78 percent accuracy.



Human brain organoids© Provided by Engadget
The team views the work as more proof of concept than something with near-term practical use. Although previous studies showed two-dimensional neuron cell cultures could do similar things, this is the first trial run using a trained three-dimensional lump of human brain cells. It could point to a future of biological computing, where the “speed and efficiency of human brains” spark a superpowered AI. (What could go wrong?)

Related video: Scientists Produce Computer Made From Lab-Grown Human Brain Cells (Amaze Lab)

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Arti Ahluwalia, a biomedical engineer at Italy’s University of Pisa, sees the technology shedding more light on the human brain. Since brain organoids can duplicate the nervous system’s control center in ways simple cell cultures can’t, the researcher views Brainoware (and the further advances it could spawn) as helping model and study neurological disorders like Alzheimer’s. “That’s where the promise is; using these to one day hopefully replace animal models of the brain,” Ahluwalia told Nature.

Challenges for the bizarre proto-cyborg tech include keeping the organoids alive, especially when moving to the more complex areas where scientists eventually want to deploy them. The brain cells must grow in an incubator, which could become more challenging with bigger organoids. The next steps include working to learn how brain organoids adapt to more complex tasks and engineering them for greater stability and reliability.

 

[luke11685]

For instance nowadays it reminds me of movies such as Robocop and Terminator…etc.

 

[OakFieldAlienz444]

This type of thing is how a robot can become sentient and possibly develop feelings
and a sense of self

 

[PaulaJedi]

This type of thing is how a robot can become sentient and possibly develop feelings
and a sense of self

And also experience mental illness, rage, etc.

 

[Wind7]

This type of thing is how a robot can become sentient and possibly develop feelings
and a sense of self

And also experience mental illness, rage, etc.

Develop extreme anxiety when it feels an Itch or some other impossibility left over from the brain tissue memory.

 

[PaulaJedi]

Develop extreme anxiety when it feels an Itch or some other impossibility left over from the brain tissue memory.

Reminds me of both Borg (Star Trek) and Cybermen (Doctor Who). Both were developed using human bodies. The human part is still there suffering. Pretty creepy.

 

[Wind7]

The Daleks come to mind, being we're talking Dr. Who.
They were basically what was left of the Kaled race which morphed into blobs
that were carried around by a robotic 'Pepper Pot'.

Ultimate AI killing machines: "Exterminate! Exterminate!!"

One of the best (Imho) Dr. Who episodes involving Daleks was called "Dalek".

This particular Dalek was having an existential crises.

 

[Beholder]

Finally the AI in games can feel real pain when you shoot them, making a more satisfying experience for the players hearing screams of horror.

 

[OakFieldAlienz444]

Reminds me of both Borg (Star Trek) and Cybermen (Doctor Who). Both were developed using human bodies. The human part is still there suffering. Pretty creepy.

Yeah, and there's also an old British secret agent series that featured two episodes with "Cybernauts"
and in the second episode actual human consciousness is taken over by programming.

 

[OakFieldAlienz444]

Think about the potential outlined in this wildass article:
https://interestingengineering.com/

Interesting Engineering
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New device allows the brain to function independently from the body​

Story by Mrigakshi Dixit • 3w



New device allows the brain to function independently from the body© Provided by Interesting Engineering
Researchers have created a novel technology that allows the brain to work independently without relying on biological input from the rest of the body.

This innovation opens new avenues for studying pure brain activity, detached from the body's influences.

“This novel method enables research that focuses on the brain independent of the body, allowing us to answer physiological questions in a way that has never been done,” said Juan Pascual of UT Southwestern Medical Center, who led this development, in an official release.

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The innovative system is known as extracorporeal pulsatile circulatory control (EPCC).

The potential applications of this device​

The brain plays a major role in the execution of various physiological processes, like heart rate, breathing, and the sleep-wake cycle, to name a few.

Simultaneously, the brain's performance is subject to influences originating from the body, such as blood sugar levels, blood pressure, and oxygenation.

According to the authors, until now, there has been no practical approach for separating the brain from the body to research how these factors impact brain function. But now, the EPCC provides a unique chance to investigate the complexity of brain activity in a regulated, isolated setting.

As per the official release, this device functions by isolating blood flow to the brain, thereby sustaining the organ and enabling it to operate independently from the rest of the body for several hours.

Related video: Scientists Produce Computer Made From Lab-Grown Human Brain Cells (Amaze Lab)

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The device underwent testing using a pig brain model.

In this experimental model, researchers diverted the blood flow to the brain via a pump, allowing them to control blood pressure, volume, temperature, oxygenation, and nutrition levels. Over five hours, the researchers noticed little to no change in brain activity and other factors.

They've already utilized this technique to learn more about the impact of hypoglycemia, or low blood sugar, in isolation from other influencing factors.

This device can potentially improve heart-lung bypass technology by simulating natural blood flow to the brain.

“Cardiopulmonary bypass devices replicate some functions of the heart and lungs, delivering a continuous flow of oxygenated blood throughout the body. In contrast, the new device delivers blood using a pulsative flow, much like the human heart, a difference that may prevent brain-related side effects sometimes caused by cardiopulmonary bypass machines," explained the release.

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The results were reported in the journal Scientific Reports.

Study abstract:

Selective vascular access to the brain is desirable in metabolic tracer, pharmacological and other studies aimed to characterize neural properties in isolation from somatic influences from chest, abdomen or limbs. However, current methods for artificial control of cerebral circulation can abolish pulsatility-dependent vascular signaling or neural network phenomena such as the electrocorticogram even while preserving individual neuronal activity. Thus, we set out to mechanically render cerebral hemodynamics fully regulable to replicate or modify native pig brain perfusion. To this end, blood flow to the head was surgically separated from the systemic circulation and full extracorporeal pulsatile circulatory control (EPCC) was delivered via a modified aorta or brachiocephalic artery. This control relied on a computerized algorithm that maintained, for several hours, blood pressure, flow and pulsatility at near-native values individually measured before EPCC.