Babies' Brains Churning With Activity
The idea of "mirror neurons" is very interesting...as you watch someone doing an action, your brain works as if you are doing the action yourself. Could be a very important part of learning motor control.
Tumor Suppressor Pulls Double Shift as Reprogramming Watchdog
Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) could potentially be the key to the future of stem cell based therapies and research. They can provide patients with a population of stem cells that are an exact genetic match, without the moral/ethical issues surrounding other methods of obtaining stem cells.
Vertical Farms
I thought that this was an interesting method to address the food problem in the world. Not sure if they took into account the price of real estate in NYC....
42 comments:
I believe that the idea of vertical farming is exquisite. The idea of using less forest land and producing the same amount of output is great. But with every solution to a problem more problems are created. For example, what would happen to the jobs of the farmers who make their living off of growing vegetables? Also like the proffesor said the government would hardly have any money to spare because of all the other problems they are trying to resolve, like healthcare. I believe that if we could resolve all the minor glitches in creating the vertical farms that it would be helpful to the earth by reducing the use of pesticides and keeping our food source intact during global warming.
In regards to the video about Vertical Farming, I think the idea is really smart and should be intergrated into large cities. Farming has not really been keeping up with modern times. As modern society changes, farming has remaind the same. This idea is a smart step in helping the enviornment and helping the climate out as well. The idea about not using soil is an intresting concept because the food would not have to be treated with pesticides and the farmers would not have to worry about humans contracting certain types of illnesses. I would really love to see more done with this man's idea.
The article "Babies' Brains Churning with Activity" was very interesting. I didn't even know that such a thing happened to monkeys. And now in infants. This truely shows that there are many things out there that we don't know about. Also I think that the mirror neurons are very interesting and I would like to understand that better through more research.
The article about babies' brains using mirror neurons was quite interesting. No one knows exactly what is going on in the mind of infants so this article gave a lot of insight into the inner-workings of an infant's mind. I found the part about how a person thinks about completing the same action as another person so they can possibly impede that person from completing their task to be quite interesting. The reality that babies are able to process such things at such a young age is fascinating.
The article about vertical farms was also intriguing because it points out a situation which has the potential to become a problem in the future. The facet of the idea which I like most is that one idea would include so many different aspects. You would need to design the buildings, find an affordable way to power the buildings, and the whole schematics of the placement of the food is very interesting. It would be quite weird to be walking down the street and look up, and see crops growing above you.
I thought the video on Vertical Farming was pretty interesting. The idea of vertical farms is a great idea. I believe vertical farms should be established in every major city all over the world. Not only will it decrease the risk of food shortages in the world but also it will reduce the risk of disease. Also I believe that these vertical farms will provide the ideal conditions for any plant. These ideal conditions set forth by the vertical farms will help the plant to grow smoothly and efficiently.
I think that the vertical farms are a good idea. It will take up less ‘ground space’, but it would still allow food to be grown. Having the buildings would allow for fewer pesticides to be used on foods and be more efficient. With the building, less or no soil could be used, allowing for fewer diseases, like salmonella. Since you can save five outdoor acres for one indoor acre, I think the vertical farms are a good idea. Although the cost would be large, I think that the vertical farms should be created.
The ‘Babies Brain’ article was very interesting learning that both money and now human have mirror neurons. I never thought or realized that we are able to use our own motor skills to figure out what a person is going to do. It is amazing that an infant at nine months is able to accomplish that. It is interesting to learn that humans and other animals, such as the monkey, have something else in common.
I loved the article "Babies' Brains Churning with Activity"it was very interesting that baby monkeys had mirror neurons working in them, and how it's possible with human infants and babies. I really think its interesting that babies in a way can comprehend at such a young age and be social!
Whenever I see a baby, I always wonder what runs in his or her mind. With EEGs performed on babies, now we know what is being processed in babies' brains. Their brains are being developed and learning at a very young age, which is great to know. Mirror neurons seem interesting at its work.
The vision of vertical farms is an interesting thought that can probably get somewhere. This would save forests and give back land that was lost before from farms. This is a smart idea in helping the environment and climate change. It is a step to a big change in this world. If this works out in NYC, vertical farms should be included in every other major city in this world. Food shortages would not be a problem anymore and with the concept of not using soil in these vertical farms, this would be great in avoiding humans from being contracted with illnesses since there would not be a need for pesticides. Problem is, what would farmers do for living if we live off of vertical farms? Also, this project would be expensive as the Columbia University Professor explained. Over all though, vertical farms would be a great future vision to work at. They would be like the "modern" farms for the future. The setup of the building is interesting- as shown at 1:34 of the video. I would like to see an avocado plant be produced from an avocado pit and pure water.
Vertical farming seems like a beneficial and probable idea. We have the technology for it to happen. I mean, there are enclosed greenhouses on rooftops in New York City, Tokyo, and London among few cities that have them, so could it be so hard to simply build a design that stacks that concept to make an entire building? Still, along with the price of real estate, the cost of maintenance would probably be unfavorable for a few decades. I've read a science fiction novel where the author writes about floating farms that are on the oceans that are created in the future to solve the same problems vertical farming wants to solve.
The "Babies' Brains Churning With Activity" artice was very interesting. It is an interesting study that can explain how babies learn an action. I found it very interesting that they can also learn by just watching as well. The most suprising thing about it was the portion about how the bain can actually predict an action before it happens. Even in the underdeveloped brain of a nine month old baby, predicting actions is possible. This is a very good reason behind the human brain preparing for situations around them. I found this to be a very interesting study.
The EEG on the babies has proved the ancient saying that babies learn by seeing and doing. Whenever I see a baby with hundreds of different toys that are different shapes and colors, I always ask myself, why do they have so many similar toys? So, by what the article is saying, they have all those toys to acclimate themselves to handling objects by seeing people around them while the mirror neurons absorb the information then allow the baby to develop that specific skill using their toys. I'll assume they learn basic things such as pushing, pulling, lifting, dropping, and picking up. Similarly, an older person, can watch someone do something then repeat the action using their mirror neurons. I never thought of it this way... I always felt like we were just capable of repeating an action of someone else, but our mirror neurons are working to enable us to copy steps or movements!
I'm not sure that I completely understand the article on the tumor suppressor. From what I got out of it, it seems as though they took the p53 cell and "reprogrammed" it to shrink tumors. I don't know why but I imagine hundreds of nanobots working inside a cell to make it shrink tumors. This is a very new medical breakthrough and it seems as though there will be much time before this becomes really useful, because reprogramming success is very low. However, even though it will take time, it will be completely worth the work when cancer can be supressed through this method.
I found the "Babies' Brains Churning With Activity" article very fascinating. It's very interesting that both monkeys and humans have motor neutrons working inside of them. It's amazing that a baby at nine months has the ability to comprehend such knowledge at a young age. I always wondered what was going on inside a baby's brain, and this article shows us that.
The video on vertical farming was very interesting and I do believe that one day most farms will not be like they are today. I am curious, however, what it would actually cost to get one of these up and running. In the end how much would it cost to buy food, which is already getting more and more expensive, from one of these vertical farms because they would have to add in the cost of the land, research, and building to the actual cost of the food so that they could recuperate their lost money? Food that is very expensive wouldn’t be a great solution because people already can’t afford food grown on farms that are already established. Also how many people would be fed for a year by one of the five story buildings he envisioned? The idea is very interesting, but I still wonder how it could work well and efficiently.
I think that mirror neutrons sound interesting. It would explain a lot of how children learn how to walk and move in certain ways.
The idea of vertical farms is very interesting, and I'd like to see it actually carried out. It seems to be even more effective than a regular farm in a few ways. For example, there would be no reason to use pesticide, as the plants would be indoors. I wonder if one large company would own all of these vertical farms and if it would eventually turn into a monopoly. Although I like the idea, I'd like to see a combination of standard farms and vertical farms.
I think its interesting how babys' motor skills in their brain are activated when someone does something. I realize that its not just babies who sees something being done and copy it. I know that when someone yawns and I see them I find myself yawning, too. I think thats cool. It kind explains how babies learn to walk and say their first word; they just copy what they see and hear other people doing.
Vertical farms are a great idea, a great source of food, doesn't take several acres to be efficient, and they look cool as well. The whole "recycling" aspect of using the dead husks etc. from the spent harvests to fuel the neighboring cities and creating even more crops is a great idea, it's pretty much like a self-sustainable being. The whole soil-free method is an interesting approach, this whole lack of the craving of the use of pesticides reminds me of this National Geographic article on how importing ladybugs and wasps are a much safer and cost effective way to combat pests, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090812-killer-bugs-crops-pests.html. The article pretty much says that with the continual use of pesticides, the pests will eventually become immune to the poison, American farmers spend at least $30 billion on pesticides a year, and that in order to attract more predatory bugs, one must have a myriad of trees surrounding a field.
The baby article was interesting, now I know mirror neurons are the right term for what I just used to call, watching and learning. The whole listening, watching, and interacting is so crucial for an infant, being able to manage activities on your own is such an important foothold for infants, such as walking and being able to go to the bathroom independently. Just a few days ago, my family came over for my nephew's 1st birthday(Preston) and my other nephew was there(Logan)who is two. When it was time to blow the candle out on the cake, Logan blew it out instead of Preston and the second go around, Preston got the picture and blew out the candle himself. Also Preston received a pushy chair device from his parents and they pushed him around in it and eventually he got up and started pushing it around as well.
The article about babies was very interesting. It is pretty incredible that people as young as 9 months use what they see in order to get an understanding of how to interact with people and objects. The fact that babies can use there own actions to predict how others will interact is very interesting as well.
I found the article on babies' brains and mirror neurons very interesting. I took ap psychology last year and mirror neurons are very important for learning how to do many of the things that are necissary for humans. This is how we learn by observation. Because of these mirror neurons, when we watch someone complete a task we feel as if we are doing it ourselves. I wonder if this is what causes many people to have strong emotional responses, such as crying, while watching movies.
I think the idea of vertical farming could be a great way to stop hunger and create green energy in the future. But in a way it seems to be a bit realistic because the world would need alot of these buildings to really make a dent in the the amount of food people consume. Making enough of these buildings would probably be very expensive.
It is amazing to see how extraordinary the brain can work. At at just a few months in age infants can respond to actions is unbelieveable. The idea of mirror neurons is miraculous. I would have never thought the brain would react to actions that a person does himself or that person watches someone else do an action. This research makes me wonder whether there are other marvelous things the brain reacts to that we are unaware of.
It's amazing to think that the loss of one small tumor suppressor gene (p53) can cause a cell to become cancerous. It was also interesting to note that cells lacking p53 had greater chances (almost a 10-fold increase) of reprogramming in comparison to cells carrying the p53 gene. After reading this article, I have begun to understand the importance of every genes. Genes are fundamental in maintaining and protecting our bodies from diseases as minor as the cold and as deadly as cancer.
I really enjoyed the video clip "Vertical Farms." I think it would be a great alternative for traditional farming and would lessen the chance of parasites on the foods we consume. Also, I thought the avacado seed method of growing plants was ingenious. However, I believe that funding for the modern-day farm would be close to impossible. With the economy the way it is, more people are becoming frugal with their earnings. To fund projects such as this is urban locations such as New York City, it would need large sums of money to make this idea a reality. Despite this financial set back, this method seems to be a great alternative to traditional farming and I'm amazed the human race has not thought of this before.
The article "Babies' Brains Churning with Activity" was truly fascinating because to think that infants can produce the same brain activity when watching a motion as if they were doing the motion is amazing. Who says babies aren't smart? I wonder if this analysis on social behavior can predict any socially challenged problems the infant will experience later in life. If so, maybe a solution can be found to lessen the severity of socially challenged children.
I think the idea of vertical farms is a great idea. There are so many benefits to this idea. First of all, a large surplus of food can be grown in cities and it can be used to help feed the hungry. Also the farms would recycle waste and create more energy. Also the weather would not play as big of a role as it used to. The vertical farms would help us to grow food through droughts or any other bad weather. Although it would be very expensive, I think that there would be many advantages to this idea. I also feel that vertical farms could be helping us get one step closer to ending world hunger.
I found the article on babies really interesting. It reminded me of the saying, "monkey see, monkey do." Babies learn from what they see and are then able to perform the witnessed actions. But, I never realized mirror neurons help with making predictions. It makes sense though, and it's interesting that an infant would be able to process and infer this information. I bet this knowledge could contribute to parenting books as well as research, especially about autism. My cousin has autism, and mirror neuron dysfunction is the cause of most of her symptoms. By learning more about mirror neurons, autism could possibly be prevented or treated in the future.
The article on babies makes sense to me. I've always heard the saying that babies are "sponges" because they "soak up" everything they hear, but to think they now can "soak up" what people are doing too is very interesting. This is definitely an eye opener, though, when we think about how babies learn. Maybe they understand how to walk or crawl by watching what we do. I hope these studies develop further, in terms of seeing how the adult mind works. This could help doctors and other people help those with disorders relating to motor skills and such.
The Babies' Brains Churning With Activity is an interesting article.The idea of evolution can been supported with this study knowing that the Mirror Neurons are also present in monkeys. Now I know why people tend to act a certain way around babies. The activity you do is being watched by the little baby right next to you!
The Vertical Farming video seemed like a fantastic and practical idea. It would lead to an increase in production without the destruction of forests for farmland. It would also give land back to trees and in turn reduce carbon emissions. Even though cost may be an issue wealthy investors should look past the cost and help to build the future. Vertical farm is a great idea and can help the human population in the near future it just needs to get moving before it is too late.
I thought that the vertical farms would be a really good solution for future agricultural problems. In the video it said that one acre of a vertical farm would be equivalent to 5-10 acres in a regular farm. The land that we would be saving building vertical farms would benefit the growing population. Vertical farms also allow the food to be healthier. Since it is not grown in soil it wouldn't have pesticides or other diseases like salmonella. The plants would be grown in pure water which i find pretty interesting, and all the waste from the plants grown would be put to good use. Some of it would be used for energy, while others would provide us with nutrients that would be used for fertilizers. The rest of the waste would be used for energy. I think there are so many benefits to using vertical farming and that the cost of building them should not be an issue.
Ah, another way to save the world from starvation: Vertical farming. This is honestly much better than that $20 billion industry that would make 3 billion people starve called Organic farming. In my honest and whole hearted opinion, I look forward to seeing how people make innovations to this idea and make it a less costly reality. However this documentary could make a more humanitarian case without the use of global warming. If people are starving, then dont worry how to feed them. Just do it. We need to stop looking for excuses to do the right things. Once entrepreneuers can make this idea plausible and affordable, then businesses will take the risk. Until we see these farms "pop up," then it is safe to say that this is not a worthy endeavor just yet.
The article on "Babies brains churning with activity" is something extremely fascinating, because how babies think and operate and absorb everything older adults do is intriguing. I have always wondered how babies reacted to actions other people do and how they copy or mirror peoples ideas. The study how these babies have mirror neurons really changed my view in the development of these young babies. I hope the researches can continue with this and find other valid information pertaining to this subject.
The vertical farms article was very strange i think it would be extremely awkward, like others said, to be walking down the street and find crops growing above you.
I think the article on mirror neurons was very interesting. I think that is a very important factor in the development of basic skills at a young age. Its actually something to wonder how infants can pick up on tasks such as walking and talking relatively easily compared to how hard it becomes later on to begin learning another language. That is probably why it is often important to demonstrate things to infants instead of doing them how you normally would.
The stem cell article reminded me of the ethical claims I learned about in biotech. Its nice to see that with this issue there may not be very much of that to deal with. It sounds like a very helpful thing they have discovered so if it can be successful and not be hindered by questions of morality then that is very fortunate.
Vertical farms are a very cool idea. It seems like the perfect solution to hunger problems and maybe if larger more industrial countries like America began implementing such structures, a huge impact can be made in ending hunger across the world. Not only that but I think it would be very interesting to see how that structure would work and the conditions that need to be maintined for growing plants indoors throughout the entire building.
Vertical farms would definitely be one of the cooler ways to combat hunger. The whole idea seems like it came out of a sci-fi novel. I agree with Erik in regards to how much more cities have become more advanced over the years while farming has remained, for the most part, the same process. Vertical farms seem like a good idea now, but we will never really know until someone decides to take the risk and put it to the test.
I think that vertical farms are a great stride in farming. The farmland that we use now eventually becomes depleted and then we must find new land. With the vertical farms, they can be built anywhere and they will recycle waste products from plants to renew the soil. The buildings also provide nice views of the plants growing inside of a glass building. Vertical farming is a great idea and I hope to see plans for it in the near future.
Babies' Brains Churning With Activity
We see lately alot of stuff on the the market to make babies smarter like, "Little Einstein" audio and videos, which my baby cousin watches.
This article provides more proof that babies are absorbing information from their environments.
The so-called mirror neurons might be the way we learn to swing a golf club. First we watch the instructor or Tiger Woods on TV, then when we are ready to swing the club ourselves our neurons are pre-programmed and help us navigate the golf swing for our selves.
"Babies' Brains Churning With Activity" was really interesting. The experiment the scientists used on the fifteen month babys was fascinating. The conclusion was that the babys were able to predict the movement of another human after expericencing that same movement first hand. This goes to show that when babys are watching soemthing there is some thought going on in their minds not just a "cute stare" that all moms go crazy for.
I know that whenever i'm with an infant, I find myself wondering what he or she could be thinking about, what's going on in their mind, and what they actually understand. I find it truly amazing how smart they can be, they soak up everything like sponges. Starting at such a young age, babies are using their brains actively, trying to learn about our world. I also thought it was fascinating how mirror neurons have only been validly measured in monkeys. It is still only speculative that they exist in humans as well.
I think that vertical farms would be an excellent idea for the future. It would help conserve space for forests which would help produce natural habitats. If they could get funding from the government then that is one thing I would actually be happy to see tax money go towards. The only thing with vertical farms is it would take a lot more time to take care of them since I couldn't see tractors inside an indoor farm.
The article "Babies Brains Churning with Activity" was extremely interesting. Within the last year, I have had three new baby cousins, all being under 1 years old. Reading that article made me picture my cousins and the way they intensely stare at people, the television, or even out a window. Also, that would explain why whenever I attempt to hold my cousins they grab at everything and anything they see. This was one of my favorite articles yet because I feel that people can greatly connect with this article
In “Babies' Brains Churning with Activity” they focus on how the brain activity of the 9 month old babies is that their predicting the action occurring by a hand grasping a toy. Could this also be a way of the infants learning how to do an action by mimicking the brain work behind it? When a normal person looks at a facial expression they feel that emotion they see as if they had made the expression themselves. Autistic children have been shown to be lacking this mirror neuron function- to compensate for this, autistic children are forced to use a different part of their brain which is not as precise. The function of the mirror neurons is truly valuable.
The article “Tumor Suppressor Pulls Double Shift as Reprogramming Watchdog” shows how cells lacking p53 are promising to be a stem cell-like state. This is immense because it lacks the controversy of real stem cells but still has the usefulness. This could yield some medical breakthroughs once used on human patients.
Vertical farming seems like a innovative way of farming that could solve many problems faced by modern farming. We’d have year round farming that would be free of weather related troubles. We’d be controlling the entire environment to make it optimal for specific plant growth. Not to mention I’m all for the organic safe produce. I’m completely for this; I’m just curious how all of it will cost.
The video about the vertical farming idea was very interesting. I feel as if this idea could be very helpful in fighting hunger by creating a surplus of food. There would be many positive aspects of vertical farming including the production of food, conservation of land where forests and trees stand, increase in green energy, and the convenience of fresh food in once over concentrated cities. However there are also a few negative aspects, cost being the main focus. If there was a more cost efficient way to start the idea and its popularity spread then the idea of vertical farming could become a very useful one in the future.
When I read this article, all I could think of was the popular saying that babies soak information in like a sponge. I found it interesting that this occurs in both babies and monkeys, and I wonder if it has something to do with evolution. But it makes sense that babies would learn by just mirroring what people do around them. I also thought of something else I learned regarding speech in babies. Whenever humans are around babies, they suddenly start speaking in "baby" and not really saying any words, just noises. I learned that it is not good to do this because of the fact that babies mirror whatever the adults do. So this article was connected to a few other topics that I've learned a little about.
The article, Babies' Brains Churning With Activity, felt like a "duh" article to me. I have seen my nephew on a daily basis and have watched the amazing development of his mind over a short period of time. I remember when he would express different sounds some when he wanted something out of reach. It is understandable that the human brain needs to figure out the brain activity it takes to do something before actually performing the action. Now that he is almost one, when he wants something, he and his determined attitude tries everything to get something he wants.
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