[extropy-chat] Wiring the Brain at the Nanoscale

[Giu1i0 Pri5c0]

This NSF press release<http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=104288&org=NSF&from=news>describes
nanowires in blood vessels which may help monitor and stimulate
neurons in the brain. Some day, nanowires routed to the brain through the 
circulatory system may help patients.
Working with platinum nanowires 100 times thinner than a human hair--and 
using blood vessels as conduits to guide the wires--a team of U.S. and 
Japanese researchers has demonstrated a technique that may one day allow 
doctors to monitor individual brain cells and perhaps provide new treatments 
for neurological diseases such as Parkinson's.
Writing in the July 5, 2005, online issue of The Journal of Nanoparticle 
Research, the researchers explain it is becoming feasible to create 
nanowires far thinner than even the tiniest capillary vessels. That means 
nanowires could, in principle, be threaded through the circulatory system to 
any point in the body without blocking the normal flow of blood or 
interfering with the exchange of gasses and nutrients through the 
blood-vessel walls.
The team describes a proof-of-principle experiment in which they first 
guided platinum nanowires into the vascular system of tissue samples, and 
then successfully used the wires to detect the activity of individual 
neurons lying adjacent to the blood vessels.
"Nanotechnology is becoming one of the brightest stars in the medical and 
cognitive sciences," said Mike Roco, Senior Advisor for Nanotechnology at 
the National Science Foundation (NSF), which funded the research.
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