VIRTUAL WORLDS

I am hoping to have a full set of components over the next 2 weeks to be able to build up a full mountain bike - (heres hoping!!!)







Below are some of the images created so far in the virtual worlds module.

SHORT & LONG TERM MEMORIES IN THE BRAIN

Scientists at the University of California, San Diego have produced dramatic images of brain cells forming temporary and permanent connections in response to various stimuli, illustrating for the first time the structural changes between neurons in the brain that, many scientists have long believed, take place when we store short-term and long-term memories.

In a paper published in the November 30 issue of the journal Cell, researchers from UCSD's Divisions of Biology and Physical Sciences describe their achievement, a "Holy Grail" for neuroscientists who have long sought concrete evidence for how nerve connections in the brain are changed temporarily and permanently by our experiences.

"The long-term memories stored in our brain last our entire lives, so everybody had assumed that there must be lasting structural changes between neurons in the brain," says Michael A. Colicos, a postdoctoral fellow at UCSD and the lead author of the paper. "Although there's been a lot of suggestive evidence to indicate that this is the case, it's never before been directly observed."

"While most people assumed that some sort of rearrangement of nerve cell connections took place in the brain, this was extremely difficult to demonstrate experimentally," says Yukiko Goda, a professor of biology at UCSD who headed the research team, which included Michael J. Sailor, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UCSD, and Boyce E. Collins, a postdoctoral fellow in Sailor's lab. "Some investigators saw increases in the number of synapses in the brain in response to stimuli, while others saw no changes. There are a billion synapses in a cubic centimeter of brain tissue, so no one could tell for certain whether the statistical comparisons of synapse density between one sample and another showed a real increase."

To resolve this problem, the UCSD researchers focused their attention on individual nerve cells, specifically neurons from the hippocampus -- the portion of the human brain crucial to forming particular types of memory -- and filmed them as their synapses made new connections to other nerve cells in response to electrical impulses.

The ability of the scientists to do this without impairing the normal physiological functions of the cells depended on two new techniques implemented in Goda's lab to study synaptic connections. One was a method of visualizing the rods and filaments of actin -- the girders that make up the cytoskeleton, the internal skeleton of the cell. Using molecular biology techniques, fluorescent versions of actin were constructed and visualized as the neurons grew and changed shape to establish new connections.

The second development, which resulted from a collaboration between Goda and Sailor, was a method of stimulating nerve cells in a manner that mimicked their stimulation in the brain. This involved using the "photoconductive" properties of silicon in a way that allowed the researchers to deliver a short, high frequency burst of electricity to a specific area of a neuron on a silicon chip by simply shining light on that area. Light excitation in that area of the silicon created a narrow pathway through which Colicos and his colleagues could apply a tiny voltage below the chip to target the neuron.
"We stimulate these cells with a short, high-frequency burst," says Colicos, working in Goda's lab. "That type of stimulation is what other researchers believed for many years was the type that formed these connections between neurons."

A key advantage of this method is that it doesn't damage the cell. "Part of the reason people haven't been able to demonstrate this before is that the technology hasn't been available to do this before," says Colicos. "The standard way of stimulating a neuron is to use an electrode. But as soon as you stab the cell with an electrode, it begins to die. So the advantage of this new technique is that we can keep the cells in their physiologically normal state. And when we stimulate the cells of our choice by shining light, we can induce the actual structural changes that occur in the brain -- the formation of these new synapses."

In their experiments, the UCSD researchers discovered that when they stimulated a cell once, the actin inside the cell was activated and temporarily moved toward neurons to which they were connected. The activity in the first cell also stimulated the movement of actin in neighboring neurons, which moved away from the activated cell. Those changes in the cells were temporary, however, lasting for about three to five minutes and disappearing within five to 10 minutes.

"The short-term changes are just part of the normal way the nerve cells talk to each other," says Colicos. "The long-term changes in the neurons occur only after the neurons are stimulated four times over the course of an hour. The synapse will actually split and new synapses will form, producing a permanent change that will presumably last for the rest of your life."

"The analogy to human memory is that when you see or hear something once, it might stick in your mind for a few minutes. If it's not important, it fades away and you forget it 10 minutes later. But if you see or hear it again and this keeps happening over the next hour, you are going to remember it for a much longer time. And things that are repeated many times can be remembered for an entire lifetime."

"It's like a piano lesson," says Goda. "If you play a musical score over and over again, it becomes ingrained in your memory."

In their experiments, which were financed in part by grants from the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, the researchers observed no changes in these newly formed nerve connections once they were established, indicating that they were permanent.

"Once you take an axon and form two new connections, those connections are very stable and there's no reason to believe that they'll go away," says Colicos. "That's the kind of change one would envision lasting a whole lifetime."

Experimental Cine Film

The film below is a short experiment that I have been playing around with after reading repots on colour memory. I have used acrylic paints and scratched some white end of cine super 8 film. The film was also left on a radiator at home to speed up the process with some interesting effects.

This piece was finding ways to utilise the scrap film that was left from an old cine film I purchased off ebay.

This exercise had made me think of other experimental ways I can produce footage that relates to memory.

Abstract cine film painted (memory in colour) from Dave Howarth on Vimeo.

influence technology has had on the graphic design industry.

influence technology has had on the graphic design industry.



Just something I came across whilst researching journals and reports on Technology and The Graphic Design Industry.

DESIGN INDUSTRY & PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE

Today I have tasked myself with undertaking an experiment with 4 3rd year students on the BA in Graphic Design at The University of Salford.

The aim of the experiment is to gauge the effect technology has had on graphic designers and the thought processes.

I have devised the brief and a short questionnaire to hopefully answer or at least make it a little clearer as to what the outcome will be.

I have an hour to kill as I have just chosen my guinea pigs and I am waiting in the soft pod in the BA Art building as they are actually having a lecture at the moment.

I will update this post later today with some of the findings.

As Danny has already stated this is also my least favourite module (Design Industry & Professional Practice) and as such putting a slight twist on it has given the project a little more meaning and makes it more relevant to me. It is really interesting to see how students of today can adapt to different situations. When I first set out in the Graphic Design Industry I started work on a drawing board and it was only 12-18 months later that the mac was introduced as a tool to aid in the design process.

I remember, at least for the first 3 or 4 months just using the mac as a glorified typesetting machine, still using the drawing board, darkroom, pmt machine and CS10 as the main tools of my trade. It was only after experimenting with the mac and chatting with other designers that the penny eventually dropped and realised that you could do pretty much everything to compose an advert or printed piece of literature on it.

This brought me to the reasoning behind my question - does technology effect the way that designers (graphic) design and more importantly impact on the thought process. I often wonder if it is true that if a designer is not confident within a software package and it is the only tool available to them that they distort their design ideas to accommodate this fact?

I am really looking forward to seeing the results this afternoon.

































After collating all the information from this afternoons experiment and interviews I have now had a chance to post up 3 of the 4 results from the exercise. It was really interesting to look and read through the results. A really interesting issue was that one of the students had produced a really nice design on the computer and just as he was finishing it off his computer crashed and lost all the work he had done. Fortunately he had the idea of photographing the frozen screen image on his iphone before restarting the computer. I will post this design up as and when I receive it on the email.














































Richard Lewis - The student who's work was lost due to a computer crash sent me through his screen grabs last night. It is a shame that the designs where not fully presented as his logo identity looks really strong. One of the pitfalls of modern technology I suppose - If you don't save your work on a regular basis you can leave yourself open to hours of stress and heartache.

MORE READING MATERIAL

After meeting up with Danny last Friday he explained that he had recently been in to a charity shop and stumbled upon 2 great design books and paid the small sum of £1.00 for each of them. When I looked at them it really struck a cord for the project I am undertaking in my "Design Industry for Professional Practice" lectures.

These books where published in 1974 and 1978 and shows techniques and tools/equipment that was available to help and aid designers around that time. Everything just looks oversized and clumsy when you read through the books but without them we wouldn't have progressed to where we are today I suppose?

The information within both books will remind me of how design used to be! Before the advent of a little computer called a Mac that revolutionised the industry that we know and love today.

I had to grab a shot of them and post them on here just to mark the fact that Danny is a jammy sod for finding such books at such a giveaway price! - They have great reference info and images to help move forward with this project and also help me with the major project on memory and film.

Virtual Worlds Project

I am at the last hurdle in producing the first deliverable for one of the smaller modules on my MA course.

This is a statement of intent/sketch/reference book to help produce a final outcome of a 3D model in 3DS MAX.

I have chosen to design a prototype mountain bike based loosely around the original motocross motorbike.

It has been an interesting journey so far with lots of research into both the motorbike and the key elements that go into producing a full suspension mountain bike.

I have just taken a snap shot of the "work in progress" I hope to be collating all the information together tomorrow once the elements have all been brought together and printed out.

I have used natural materials as part of this brief to answer the eco and carbon foot print issues that go with any mass produced product in todays "green" world.