Consciousness and Brain Waves

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I really liked this article. Of course it was published online by my favorite~ Psychology Today. Dr. Brogaard and the researchers at MIT and Boston University ​ are exploring the intersection of the mind and consciousness.
I love this!
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Brain Waves as Neural Correlates of Consciousness

by Berit Brogaard, D.M.Sci., Ph.D
November 23, 2012

When we are thinking, thoughts flicker in and out of our minds. What does that mean on the level of the brain? Recent research, conducted by researchers at MIT and Boston University, suggests that when thoughts are in our minds, corresponding groups of neurons are oscillating in synchrony in a high frequency range, around 30 or higher, whereas thoughts that are no longer in our minds oscillate at lower frequencies. When several, distinct thoughts are held in mind simultaneously, several oscillating bundles are out of sync with each other.

The normal waken brain has brain activity that fluctuates between 8 and 100 Hz. An alert and active brain will tend to have neural oscillations, roughly, in the 40 Hz range in at least some parts of the brain. These brain waves are also known as gamma waves. Alpha waves—oscillations in the 8 to 12 Hz frequency range—and beta waves—oscillations in the 12 to 30 Hz range—become more prominent when you are inactive, for example, when you are passively watching television. Brain dead people and coma patients can have oscillations that approach zero. And in seizure patients the brain oscillates even faster and more regions of the brain vacillate in the same frequency range. In a grand mal seizure large areas of the brain flicker in synchrony at extremely high frequencies.

To find out how neurons oscillate when we think or perform tasks, the research team, led by Earl Miller, the Picower Professor of Neuroscience at MIT​, first identified two groups of neurons in monkeys that encode specific behavioral rules by oscillating in synchrony with each other. The research animals were trained to respond to objects based on either their color or orientation. When the animals switched between the tasks encoded by the rues, the researcher measured brain activity in the prefrontal cortex, where working memory is located. The researchers found that the neurons associated with orientation oscillated in synchrony at higher frequencies when the monkeys were completing the orientation task, whereas the neurons associated with the color took over when the animals switched from thinking about orientation to thinking about color.

The team also found that the brain uses lower-frequency brain waves to inhibit neurons when they are not needed. For example, when the monkeys engaged in the color task, the neuron group corresponding to the orientation task would oscillate at a lower frequency, in the lower alpha range. This would inhibit these neurons sufficiently to enable the moneys to engage consciously in the color task.

It appears, then, that consciousness associated with working memory, the ability to keep a few pieces of information in mind at a time, correlates with groups of neurons oscillating at a high frequency but out of sync with each other. Its the brain’s ability to keep bundles of neurons simultaneously oscillating at 40 Hz that determines how much information you can hold in mind at any given time.

The findings, published in the November 2012 issue of Neuron​, are consistent with the so-called 40 Hz theory of consciousness. British molecular biologist and neuroscientist Francis Crick​, better known for his co-discovery of the structure of DNA, argued that consciousness arises when certain brain regions fire in synchrony in the 40 Hz frequency range. The researchers didn’t locate gamma-range activity in the moneys during task completion, but this could be because different frequencies are required for consciousness in humans and monkeys.

This 40 Hz theory of consciousness explains some of our findings in the St. Louis Syn Lab​. In our lab we have worked with several people who developed special abilities as well as obsession as a result of traumatic brain injury​ (TBI). TBI occurs when the brain is injured by an external force. TBI can occur either as a result of blunt force trauma or shock waves from a blast. In both situations, the inside of the accelerated skull comes into contact with one side of the brain, generating a secondary shock wave throughout the soft tissue. If the force is strong enough, it can cause the brain to “bounce” off the other side of the skull, resulting in another shock wave. The waves emanating through the brain twist and pull on the connections between neurons, tearing them apart, causing damage to different areas. Depending on the severity of the shock wave, TBI can be very extensive, and multiple TBI incidents can have compounding effects. It is a particularly devastating problem for soldiers who repeatedly sustain mortar shell attacks at close to mid range. Many of them report memory coordination problems years later.

Physical force to the head triggers a centralization of brain activity in local areas, causing a concussion. During a concussion the nerve function of several distinct brain regions become paralyzed as a result of the brain bumping into the skull as it shakes inside the head. When this happens, positively charged potassium ions inside the nerve cells rush outside the nerve cells and calcium ions replace them inside the cells. This shuts down the neuron’s internal engine preventing the nerve cells from burning energy sources (primarily glucose) and giving rise to huge uncontrolled release of neurotransmitters, which bombard or “frag” neighboring neurons. This neuronal fragging causes the affected neurons to die off, leading to scar tissue, whereas other affected neurons gradually regain normal function.

Though we don’t yet fully know the long-term effects of traumatic brain injury, it is possible that the uncontrolled release of neurotransmitters from dying neurons massively enhances brain activity in neighboring brain regions, giving rise to syncronized brain oscillations in the gamma frequency range, and that the brain activity in these regions remains abnormally high on a more permanent basis.

Visual imagery is far the most common way for the brain to represent the world. So it is unsurprising if brain waves in the high frequency range were to yield visual images corresponding to the hyperactivity. After being beaten up Jason Padgett experienced visual images are complex mathematical patterns, and Derek Amato experienced visual images of black and white musical notes after the impact with the pool floor. The visual images appear to make it possible for the two unschooled geniuses to act on excessive brain activity in ways that would not otherwise be possible.

Geneticists Create 'Bi-Fi'—The Biological Internet

Reblogged from Xenophilia (True Strange Stuff):

By engineering a parasitical virus, geneticists have taken the first steps toward creating a biological internet in which the body's processes can be improved by controlling the natural communication abilities of cells. Using the M13 virus, Stanford researchers have created a mechanism to send genetic messages from cell to cell. "The system greatly increases the complexity and amount of data that can be communicated between cells and could lead to greater control of biological functions within cell communities."

Read more… 91 more words

This is absolutely amazing!!!! I love this... ~F

HR 5987- A Bill to Establish the Manhattan Project National Historical Park

The Oak Ridger published this article online today. This project plays an interesting part of New Mexico history in conjunction with the Los Alamos National Laboratory. This publication comes out of Oak Ridge, Tennessee where the Oak Ridge National Laboratory is located.

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Manhattan Project Nat’l

Historical Park testimony,

Part II

OAK RIDGE, Tenn. —

Continuing the summary of the testimony I was privileged to be asked to give at the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands on H. R. 5987, a bill to establish the Manhattan Project National Historical Park in Oak Ridge, Tenn., Los Alamos, New Mexico, and Hanford, Washington. The full text of the testimony can be viewed at the following: http://www.oakridger.com/columnists/x1655031678/Ray-Smiths-testimony-on-the-Manhattan-Project-Natl-Park-bill

In addition to the three government sites, covered last week, the city of Oak Ridge has assets that will contribute to the Manhattan Project National Historical Park. The Guest House/Alexander Inn is among the most historic structures in the Manhattan Project. It is in a sad state of disrepair now, but has been included in the latest draft of a memorandum of agreement for historic preservation of the K-25 site at East Tennessee Technology Park as an alternative historic preservation initiative complimentary to the other historic preservation actions.

Other portions of the historic city of Oak Ridge may well serve as integral parts or guided tour portions of the Manhattan Project National Historical Park, such as the Chapel on the Hill (first church), alphabet houses, Midtown Community Center, Jackson Square Town Site, the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge, the Oak Ridge Public Library’s Oak Ridge Room and Center for Oak Ridge Oral History and the especially appropriate American Museum of Science and Energy.

The museum has been the mainstay of Oak Ridge Manhattan Project and other related history exhibits since March 19, 1949, when the secret city of Oak Ridge was opened to the public for the first time as the gates to the main roads were removed. That same day, the American Museum of Atomic Energy, as it was known until 1978, opened its doors for the first time and welcomed visitors.

When the museum moved to its present location it also changed its name to the American Museum of Science and Energy and expanded its mission for exhibits and focus to a broader energy related theme. However, it kept its role as a primary source of Oak Ridge history.

Today, the museum is the hub of tourist activity in Oak Ridge, being the first stop for most visitors and a must stop for all visitors. The museum’s Oak Ridge Room is the place where visitors first understand the unique history of the people who were notified first through a phone call from their Senator Kenneth McKellar to the Oliver Springs High School principal telling him to tell the students to go home and tell their parents about the coming changes in their neighborhoods. Lester Fox, still living today, swears that is the way the 3,000 people living in New Hope, Robertsville, Elza, Scarboro and other small communities in this area first learned that 60,000 acres would be used for the Manhattan Project that would become Oak Ridge.

Virtually Pop Your Top

A virtual collection of electronic records which can be sorted using your fingers and a touch screen the size of a movie screen. The data can also be manipulated in various ways to improve collection control. This image was taken at the 2012 E-Records Forum in Austin, Texas. An Open House at the Texas Advanced Computing Center’s Visualization Lab was apparently a “highlight” of the forum.

As promised, it is time to mention the most interesting person I had the chance to talk with at the NAGARA/CoSA Conference in Santa Fe last week. I guess when you ask the right questions “they” will come! By they I mean the smart people… After one of the sessions, Mark Conrad an Archives Specialist working with the Applied Research Division (Office of Information Services) of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) approached me. He said “aren’t you the one asking about open source solutions?” But of course I was the one! I was so excited to here that NARA is going there!!! I also had the chance to attend a session titled ISO 16363 Audit and Certification of Trustworthy Digital Repositories. The session was delivered by Mark and Technology Specialists from Kentucky. This “Archives Specialist” slash technical guru immediately started rattling off a list of tools and projects that I should take a closer look at. Using his tricked out iPad he started prompting his screen to pop my top. Mark works in the Center for Advanced Systems and Technologies (NCAST). In his position with NARA, he works with computer scientists and engineers from all over the world “to leverage new theories, knowledge, methods, and techniques to advance the lifecycle of electronic records.” Part of the mission of his division includes looking into “emerging technologies.” I must say I about did a back flip when Mark pulled up images of a Visualization Lab in the works. Simply mind blowing! There it was— a virtual filing cabinet. As an archivist, I would be able to process or arrange and describe electronic records by using my fingers and a touch screen. Yes- a touch screen- a virtual system used to arrange collections and sort data- with color codes and all. The volume of records in a particular series is proportional to the amount of data within a particular sector of the collection. In January of 2011, the web administrator of NARAtions: The Blog of the United States National Archives interviewed Mark Conrad. She asked him what he was working on and he said “with the assistance of 17 student interns, I am collaborating on a number of projects. For example, many of the students are currently loading large numbers of files into a testbed that is being used by the computer scientists working on the CI-BER project. The purpose of the project is to provide insights into the management of very large data collections. As the number of files and bytes in a collection goes up some of the systems used to manage the collection break down. This project will help us to identify some of the bottlenecks and look for better ways to build systems that don’t break down as the volume picks up.” He also said he was working with the “Department of Energy, NIST, Naval Sea Systems Command, Army Research Lab, and other Federal Agencies on ways to share information about current and emerging practices for managing and preserving engineering data for as long as it is needed.” Sometimes I am glad that I ask a grippa questions— if I didn’t care about open source solutions, I would have never met one of the most interesting archivists with a technical background ever.

Smoke and Mirrors: My First Lucid Dream

This morning it was very hard for me to get out of bed. The second I opened my eyes, I could feel an indescribable ache in my head. I couldn’t understand why I felt so horrible? In my moment of contemplation, I realized that I was smoking in my dream. I am not a smoker, but yet I was blowing smoke like my first name was Puff (yes the Magic Dragon). But it was just a dream? Wasn’t it? I laid around for awhile. I tossed, I turned, I debated calling in to work because I literally felt sick. When I finally got out of bed, I rushed over to the bottle that I felt would give me some hope for the day. I popped an 800 mg Ibuprofen, washed it down with some caffeine, and then convinced myself that the headache would disappear. By the time I darted out the door for the day, my headache was gone. I thought about it all morning… I mean how strange is it to have a headache from smoking in my dreams? I did dream about many other things, but I knew the smoke caused my head to ache. As the day progressed, I wondered… Did I ever really have a headache at all? Or was it all in my head? No pun intended! I know in my waking life any kind of smoke often causes me to get real headaches, but can it cause a headache in the dream world as well, or did last night mark my first concrete proof of a mind-body connection?

Let Me Dream- Bookplate of Anita Herriman Vedder (ca 1870-1923)- Item No. LC-DIG-ppmsca-15533- Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA

The more the day went on, the more I believed that my experience was purely metapsychological. Now I know that I was likely still asleep when I believed I awoke with a headache. I know that I had the first lucid dream that I can actually recall. It was a lucid dream with something that is called a false awakening. Metapsychology is basically the psychological connection between mind and body. Many say that metapsychology is “beyond what can be studied,” but am I not studying it right now? “Meta” is derived from the Greek word for transcendence and/or going beyond something. For example… Have you ever had a dream where you were doing anything physical and then really woke up with soar muscles? Apparently I am not the only person who has experienced this type of phenomenon. There are some extreme cases out there. Some people wake up with scratches, bruises, and other serious injuries. Just look for yourself, and follow some of the subject threads available online. Since I am a woman who prefers well rounded research, I prefer to look at four things to make my own conclusion. Those four things are: my personal experience; the experiences of everyday people; scholarly approaches; and scientific studies.

In lucid dreaming, the person dreaming can control what they do in a dream. The dreams are often realistic, but are still fluid enough to be influenced by the dreamer. Maybe because I love writing and being creative, I am able to control some of the data which infiltrates my mind (to some degree)? If I was indeed having my first identifiable lucid dream, then it is highly likely that I experienced a false awakening from that dream. If this is the case then it makes total sense that I was in my own room when I opened my eyes and discovered I had a headache. During a false awakening, the dreamer almost always thinks they are awake because they are in the exact place where they originally drifted off to sleep. Some scholars would say that if I had a lucid dream last night, it would make sense that I was not even awake when I thought I woke up! I probably actually woke up just seconds before I actually got out of bed.

A Study in butter the dreaming Iolanthe- butter sculpture of sleeping woman by Caroline S. Brooks (c1878)- Item No. LC-USZ62-93747- Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA

In 2007, the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association published a white paper by Peter Fonagy and Mary Target. The paper examined Theory and Psychoanalytic Thought, and was titled The Rooting of the Mind in the Body: New Links Between Attachment. Fonagy and Target studied “the relationship between psychoanalysis and attachment theory” and they described that relationship as “complex.” The scholars researched the “whole idea of the mind comprehensively expressing itself exclusively through bodily referents,” and state that this expression derives from Sigmund Freud’s studies of the “ego” and “body-ego.” According to the paper, “any separation between cognition and physical manifestations at the level of brain, bodily sensations, or actions is an artifact of the cognitivists’ computer metaphor, which implies that cognitive processes can be independent of the body, just as software exists more or less independent of hardware. In general, it is the link of brain and body that generates mind and consciousness. Emotion, mood, and motivation act in concert with cognition, primed by evolution to ensure the survival of the person as a whole.”

Dr. Donald DeGracia published his study in 1997 out of Wayne State University titled Paradigms of Consciousness During Sleep. In his study, Dr. DeGracia attempts “to conceptualize conscious sleep experiences.” His paradigm research confirms that “the most common conscious sleep experience is dreaming.” The paper goes on to say that “dreams are a form of conscious awareness during sleep, and that “when we dream, we are consciously aware of visual, auditory, tactile, kinesthetic and emotional content, as well as thought (both cognitive and metacognitive) and to lesser extents smells, taste and pain.” Hum?? Very interesting. This PhD has discovered that “in a lucid dream, the brain undergoes some kind of change that gives the dreamer metacognitive access to their waking memories. Hence, it may be that a lucid dream is a dream in which the dreamer can compare their present condition with their waking life. It is this ability to compare the dream experience to waking experience that really appears to distinguish lucid dreams from nonlucid dreams.”

The dream of Pilate's wife by Alphonse Francois (c1879)- Item No. LC-DIG-pga-01296- Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA

So here is my conclusion… I am 99.9% sure that I had my first recognizable lucid dream. Amazing… It seems that I may have been dreaming I had a headache because I was tapping into latent memories of my experiences with things that cause my head to ache! I had a headache because my mind caused my body to believe it should. I would even go as far to say that muscle memory could have been at work here. I can thank the long gone love of my life, Sigmund Freud for a few things today. Some of those things include: his beautifully sexy brain; the ability of his once lively mind to spark my contemporary mind; his amazing breakthroughs in 1895 relative to the philosophical study of the relationship between the body and the mind; and his still unmatched 1899 study on the Interpretation of Dreams.

Sources:

Theory and Psychoanalytic Thought,
The Rooting of the Mind in the Body:
New Links Between Attachment (2007)
Peter Fonagy and Mary Target
Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association

http://apa.sagepub.com

Paradigms of Consciousness During Sleep (1997)
Donald J. DeGracia, PhD
Wayne State University
www.med.wayne.edu/degracialab/metaphysics/paradigms.pdf

DARPA Brainz Enhance Reality Using Contact Lenses!

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency/US Dept. of Defense… Researchers Create New Contacts

Yet another one of my dream jobs would be to work for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The agency is part of the United States Department of Defense. These knowledge eaters spit fire and develop mind-blowing computer technology for the military. The agency also has a slick mirrored building as the “headquarters” in Arlington, Virginia. Now check out this hot news. Wow!!! I am amazed by this!!! This is real and unbelievable- really… I am due for an eye appointment- wonder if Dr. B can fit me for some of these puppies???
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DARPA researchers design eye-enhancing virtual reality contact lenses

Originally published online by DARPA on January 31, 2012 

Currently being developed by DARPA researchers at Washington-based Innovega iOptiks are contact lenses that enhance normal vision by allowing a wearer to view virtual and augmented reality images without the need for bulky apparatus.  Instead of oversized virtual reality helmets, digital images are projected onto tiny full-color displays that are very near the eye.  These novel contact lenses allow users to focus simultaneously on objects that are close up and far away.  This could improve ability to use tiny portable displays while still interacting with the surrounding environment.

Developed as part of DARPA’s Soldier Centric Imaging via Computational Cameras (SCENICC) program, SCENICC’s objective is to eliminate the ISR capability gap that exists at the individual Soldier level.  The program seeks to develop novel computational imaging capabilities and explore joint design of hardware and software that give war fighters access to systems that greatly enhance their awareness, security and survivability.

Please direct all media queries to: DARPAPublicAffairsOffice@DARPA.mil

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400 Year Old Archive: Secrets of the Vatican

Clip taken from a section of a document in the Trial of Galileo (1633). The document is in the Vatican's Secret Archive- Clip taken from Vatican’s Secret Archives turn 400 years old- http://www.romereports.com/

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Today is the birthday of the Vatican’s Secret Archive, which dates back to January 31, 1612. The archive is full of amazing documents. Despite the colorful comments that can be found tied to the fact that the archive remains “secret,” this archive houses some of the most fascinating documents in the world. Documents in the archive have been made available with the pre-approval of authorities (of course) to academics and historians over the years. My guess would be that preference is given to scholars whom convey a positive image of the church. There are more than 50 miles of shelves in this archive. The records contained in the archives span 12 centuries of history. As an archivist who loves history, science, and the stars, my favorite documents housed in the archive would likely be those associated with the Trial of Galileo. He was a bit of a thorn in the side of the Roman Inquisition, and details of his 1633 trial are among the “secrets” this archive keeps. Galileo Galilei battled with the Catholic Church until his death in 1642. The church did not like him mainly because he was against the Aristotelian theory of the universe, and he favored astronomy and the Copernican theory. Artists have rendered interpretations (in various media) of his inquisition for centuries. It is a very interesting case! When you get a chance, check out this video footage about the anniversary of the archive at http://youtu.be/8naSnSysKmg.

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Clip taken from a document is in the Vatican's Secret Archive- Clip taken from Vatican’s Secret Archives turn 400 years old- http://www.romereports.com/

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*****Coat of Arms of the Holy See***** Is this a cryptogram? Things that come to mind... There are two keys- number 11? Why is one key gold and the other silver? The keys would open seperate doors, yet they are bound together by the handle and in the center (with a cross). I see the number 3 repeated 4 times in the crown. That equals 12. There were 12 Apostles. There were also several 12th-century Roman Catholic Church Councils. 12 is a symbol of cosmic order. "Europe's Apostasy and Idolatry The Flag: Do we see an 'ecclesiastical Babylon' in Europe? The European Union (EU) flag comprises 12 golden stars on a blue background. Officially it is claimed that the circle of 12 stars represents 'solidarity and harmony between the peoples of Europe', the number 12 denoting 'perfection, completeness and unity' (in the Bible, 12 denotes 'governmental perfection')."

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Vatican’s Secret Archives turn 400 years old

Originally published online on 1.31.2012 by http://www.romereports.com/

Within the walls of Vatican City is stored one of the most important treasures in the world, the Vatican’s Secret Archives.

Only a limited number of people can access documents kept here by the Catholic Church. It’s free to gain access, but only academics and historians are allowed and they must request authorization from the Vatican.

In 1810, Napoleon Bonaparte took over 3,000 documents to Paris. After his fall from power, the files over time made their way back to the Vatican. Although during these transfers, many valuable documents were lost, some of which were from the fifth century.

Today, 400 years after its creation, the archive has over 50 miles of shelving, filled with books, papal bulls, decrees and encyclicals that cover twelve centuries of history. Among its corridors, one can find documents like the parchment of acquittal of Clement V to the Templars, from August of the year 1308, and details from the trial of Galileo, as well as the request for a marriage annulment by England’s King Henry VIII.

To celebrate it’s 400th anniversary, the exhibition “Lux in Arcana” has been created. From March to September, visitors to Rome can find 100 documents from the Vatican’s Secret Archives on display in the Capitoline Museums.

Vatican’s Secret Archives turn 400 years old

http://www.romereports.com/palio/vatican%27s-secret-archives-turns-400-years-old-english-5959.html

Gideon’s Corpse

Hart Island_Burial Grounds

The new book, Gideon’s Corpse by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child was released on January 10, 2012. This book is sure to be good. The last Preston book I got was the true crime novel The Monster of Florence. I have not met Child, but Preston is a very humble, sweet, and famous, New York Times Best Seller. I had the pleasure of meeting Preston and hearing him speak at the 2011 Tony Hillerman Writers Conference in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I loved this guy- he seems so quiet and shy, but he has a dark mind, and it permeates his writing. Serious- he sells his autographed books out of the Poisoned Pen Bookstore for God’s sake!

Gideon’s Corpse has the following: a mad nuclear scientist turned killer; a radiation plume over New York City; a nuclear bomb; and the mountains of New Mexico. What I found most interesting was how Preston got inspired for the Gideon books! Wow! Read some quotes from a piece published by Doug Preston on the Preston/Child web site…

Here is a photograph I took of David Morrell (author of Rambo) and Doug Preston (author of Monster of Florence and the Gideon books). They were having an author to author chat at the Hillerman Writers Conference in Santa Fe.

“As some of you know, I made a guerrilla landing on Hart Island, the largest burial ground in the world, while researching our novel GIDEON’S SWORD. By the way, Linc has asked me to make clear that HE DID NOT TAKE PART IN THIS IDIOTIC AND DANGEROUS EXPEDITION.”

“The bus in the background is full of Rikers Island inmates brought to Hart Island to bury bodies. If you are not a corpse, the only way to visit Hart Island is if you murder someone, get sent to Rikers Island, and are put on a prison burial crew. Hart Island is the potter’s field for New York City, where the indigent have been buried for a century and a half. The island is controlled by the Department of Correction and all the burial work is done by inmates.

While researching Hart Island, I came across a strange piece of information. There is something else buried on Hart Island, something a lot creepier than mere corpses. When we came across this strange and startling fact, it immediately gave us the central idea for our thriller novel, Gideon’s Sword.”

“And this deserted island might just be the most haunted place in all of New York. In addition to being the largest burial ground in the world, Hart Island was once a quarantine for sailors with yellow fever; a tubercularium; a Nike missile base; a boy’s workhouse; and an insane asylum for women. Now the hundred-acre island is completely uninhabited, dotted with buildings falling into ruin. It made for an extraordinary setting for our novel, with its vast graveyards, decaying missile silos, dormitories preserving the sad and desperate graffiti of boys without hope, an old chapel, and (of all things) an abandoned baseball diamond whose rotting bleachers came from Ebbets Field.

To research the setting for Gideon’s Sword, I tried to get permission to visit the island. Permission was denied. The island is completely and absolutely off limits to everyone but dead people, prisoners, and guards. If I wanted to see the island, there was only one way: to make a guerilla landing.”

“I peeked through the weeds and saw a pumped-up corrections officer running through the weeds, his Glock drawn.”

“We’re just tourists!” I cried. “We didn’t do anything!”

“Tourists?” He squinted at us, rose, holstered his weapon.

“From New Mexico! Tourists from New Mexico!” And in a flash I had my wallet out, waving my New Mexico driver’s license. He took it, squinted at it, stared at my wife. “And your ID, lady?”

If you have time- read the full story here it is well worth it. Check out the new book as well…http://www.prestonchild.com/books/gideonssword/hartisland/What-Is-Buried-on-Hart-Island-;art321,363

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Black Hole Data Archive…

San Diego Supercomputer

To continue on the topic of black holes… Prepare to boggle your brain!!! I spent a bit this evening looking for something I wrote a while back to add to my afternoon post. A few years ago, I wrote a small piece about black holes being a type of storage device (yes like an external hard drive or a digital archive). Some scientists and physicists believe that dinosaurs may be a part of a black hole archive. Maybe they are stored away to be retrieved at a later date?? Yes- some do believe this!! For the life of me I can’t find what I wrote. I will keep looking! As a certified digital information manager, as an archivist, and as a former records manager, this seriously intrigues me— I am also obsessed with black holes, stars, planets, and space. I did find some relatively current information- so check this out…

Holograms, Black Holes, and the Nature of the Universe
by Kate Becker
November 15, 2011

“black holes, which turn out to be the universe’s ultimate information-storage devices.”

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/physics/blog/2011/11/holograms-black-holes-and-the-nature-of-the-universe/

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How Do You Photograph a Black Hole?

Image of a Black Hole_NASA

Scientists Prepare to Take First-Ever Picture of a Black Hole

by Daniel Stolte
Originally published on UANews.org
by the University of Arizona Office of Communications
January 13, 2012

The Event Horizon Telescope is an Earth-sized virtual telescope powerful enough to see all the way to the center of our Milky Way, where a supermassive black hole will allow astrophysicists to put Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity to the test.

Astronomers, physicists and scientists from related fields across the world will convene in Tucson, Ariz. on Jan. 18 to discuss an endeavor that only a few years ago would have been regarded as nothing less than outrageous.

The conference is organized by Dimitrios Psaltis, an associate professor of astrophysics at the University of Arizona’s Steward Observatory, and Dan Marrone, an assistant professor of astronomy at Steward Observatory.

“Nobody has ever taken a picture of a black hole,” Psaltis said. “We are going to do just that.”

“Even five years ago, such a proposal would not have seemed credible,” added Sheperd Doeleman, assistant director of the Haystack Observatory at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, or MIT, who is the principal investigator of the Event Horizon Telescope, as the project is dubbed. “Now we have the technological means to take a stab at it.”

First postulated by Albert Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, the existence of black holes has since been supported by decades’ worth of observations, measurements and experiments. But never has it been possible to directly observe and image one of these maelstroms whose sheer gravity exerts such cataclysmic power that it twists and mangles the very fabric of space and time.

“Black holes are the most extreme environment you can find in the universe,” Doeleman said.

The field of gravity around a black hole is so immense that it swallows everything in its reach; not even light can escape its grip. For that reason, black holes are just that – they emit no light whatsoever, their “nothingness” blends into the black void of the universe.

So how does one take a picture of something that by definition is impossible to see?

“As dust and gas swirls around the black hole before it is drawn inside, a kind of cosmic traffic jam ensues,” Doeleman explained. “Swirling around the black hole like water circling the drain in a bathtub, the matter compresses and the resulting friction turns it into plasma heated to a billion degrees or more, causing it to ‘glow’ – and radiate energy that we can detect here on Earth.”

By imaging the glow of matter swirling around the black hole before it goes over the edge and plunges into the abyss of space and time, scientists can only see the outline of the black hole, also called its shadow. Because the laws of physics either don’t apply to or cannot describe what happens beyond that point of no return from which not even light can escape, that boundary is called the Event Horizon.

“So far, we have indirect evidence that there is a black hole at the center of the Milky Way,” Psaltis said. “But once we see its shadow, there will be no doubt.”

Even though the black hole suspected to sit at the center of our galaxy is a supermassive one at 4 million times the mass of the sun, it is tiny to the eyes of astronomers. Smaller than Mercury’s orbit around the sun, yet almost 26,000 light years away, it appears about the same size as a grapefruit on the moon.

“To see something that small and that far away, you need a very big telescope, and the biggest telescope you can make on Earth is to turn the whole planet into a telescope,” Marrone said.

To that end, the team is connecting up to 50 radio telescopes scattered around the globe, including the Submillimeter Telescope on Mt. Graham in Arizona, telescopes on Mauna Kea in Hawaii and the Combined Array for Research in Millimeter-wave Astronomy in California. The global array will include several radio telescopes in Europe, a 10-meter dish at the South Pole and potentially a 15-meter antenna atop a 15,000-foot peak in Mexico.

“In essence, we are making a virtual telescope with a mirror that is as big as the Earth,” Doeleman said. “Each radio telescope we use can be thought of as a small silvered portion of a large mirror. With enough such silvered spots, one can start to make an image.”

“The Event Horizon Telescope is not a first-light project, where we flip a switch and go from no data to a lot of data,” he added. “Every year, we increase its capabilities by adding more telescopes, gradually sharpening the image we see of the black hole.”

One crucial and eagerly expected key element about to join Event Horizon’s global network of radio telescopes is the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, or ALMA, in Chile.
Comprising 50 radio antennas itself, ALMA will function as the equivalent of a dish that is 90 meters in diameter and become what Doeleman called “a real game changer.”

“We will be able to actually see what happens very close to the horizon of a black hole, which is the strongest gravitational field you can find in the universe,” Psaltis said. “No one has ever tested Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity at such strong fields.”

General Relativity predicts that the bright outline defining the black hole’s shadow must be a perfect circle. According to Psaltis, whose research group specializes in Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, this provides an important test.

“If we find the black hole’s shadow to be oblate instead of circular, it means Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity must be flawed,” he said. “But even if we find no deviation from general relativity, all these processes will help us understand the fundamental aspects of the theory much better.”

Black holes remain among the least understood phenomena in the universe. Ranging in mass from a few times the mass of the sun to billions, they appear to coalesce like drops of oil in water. Most if not all galaxies are now believed to harbor a supermassive black hole at their center, and smaller ones are scattered throughout. Our Milky Way is known to be home to about 25 smallish black holes ranging from 5 to 10 times the sun’s mass.

“What is great about the one in the center of the Milky Way is that is big enough and close enough,” Marrone said. “There are bigger ones in other galaxies, and there are closer ones, but they’re smaller. Ours is just the right combination of size and distance.”

The reason astronomers rely on radio waves rather than visible or infrared light to spy on the black hole is two-fold: For one, observing the center of the Milky Way from the Earth requires peering right through the plane of the galaxy. Radio waves are able to penetrate thousands of light-years worth of stars, gas and dust obstructing the view. Secondly, combining optical telescopes into a virtual super-telescope would not be feasible, according to the researchers.

Only very recent technological advances have made it possible to not only record radio waves at just the right wavelengths where they don’t interfere with water vapor in the atmosphere but also to ensure the ultra-precise timing necessary to combine observations from multiple telescopes thousands of miles apart into one exposure.

Each telescope will record its data onto hard drives, which will be collected and physically shipped to a central data processing center at MIT’s Haystack Observatory.

Bringing together radio telescopes around the globe requires an equally global team effort.

“This is not only the usual international conference where people come from all over the world because they are interested in sharing their research,” Psaltis said. “For the Event Horizon Telescope, we need the entire world to come together to build this instrument because it is as big as the planet. People are coming from all over the world because they have to work on it.”

Scientists Prepare to Take First-Ever Picture of a Black Hole
http://uanews.org/node/44218

Iris: Divine Rainbow Goddess and Messenger of the Olympians

*****Digital composite by Felicia***** My representation of Iris, Goddess of the Rainbow consists of five images and was created using layers and masks. The representation also incorporates my spiral symbol.

Be thou the rainbow in the storms of life. The evening beam that smiles the clouds away, and tints tomorrow with prophetic ray.
*****Lord Byron

The soul would have no rainbow had the eyes no tears.
*****John Vance Cheney

Iris the divine Rainbow Goddess was a messenger of the Olympians. She was fast and reliable. The goddess served and delivered messages for both Zeus and Hera. Some myths depict Iris as the personification of the rainbow. In other myths, Iris is the mother of Eros, the God of Love. If it was indeed she whom birthed Eros, it is not surprising that she was usually portrayed as loving, kind, and helpful. The sightly Iris is said to have used water from the River Styx to assist other immortals in the renewing of their vows. After filling their cups she delivered messages, ambrosia, and nectar. With her gifts, she replenished immortals. In her mortal and divine forms, the mythical Iris was breathtaking. Her picture of divinity is often rendered with a gold caduceus in hand, and magnificent golden or rainbow wings. The goddess was able to use the rainbow as a portal between Heaven and Earth. Iris was given the gift of flight to aid in the swift delivery of messages to other immortals, as well as to mortals on Earth.

A rainbow is often formed following a storm, and is also associated with golden treasure; therefore Iris and her instrument can be seen as signs of hope and prosperity. Iris and the rainbow embody a symbolic move from darkness to light, and the bow offers an intense spectrum of color as such. In 1984, Julia L. Epstein and Mark L. Greenberg published a white paper titled Decomposing Newton’s Rainbow in the Journal of the History of Ideas (Vol. 45, No. 1, pgs. 115-140). The paper was published by the University of Pennsylvania Press, and revealed some research connecting rainbow myth with scientific studies. “Clearly, Newton investigated natural phenomena-light, vision, color-that had for centuries been invested with symbolic mystical and religious significance, and had also attracted serious scientific investigators from antiquity on. Yet a key answer to this question lies in understanding that, although Newton’s exposition of light’s properties, for example, was not itself figurative or laden with rhetorical invention, a great part of its appeal to poets lay in its power to evoke images and metaphors.”

“This attempt to forge a language in which words are equivalent to things, of course, represented a linguistic ideal. Language was to annihilate metaphorical modes of expression, according to these new standards, through reduction to a pure sign system in which metaphor would be literalized. The universal language philosophers of the period sought for was a symbolic representation of discoveries in natural philosophy that would be wholly adequate to the processes of the material world.” Epstein and Greenberg acknowledged that the ultimate goal of Newton and poets was “to record the evanescent, to translate light and color into language,” and “to portray the arc and texture of a rainbow.” As Henry David Thoreau once said “the true harvest of my daily life is somewhat as intangible and indescribable as the tints of morning or evening. It is a little star dust caught, a segment of the rainbow which I have clutched.” After learning more about Iris, may we continue to grasp at least a part of our metaphorical rainbow, and in turn satisfy our soul.

A Christmas Star Explosion: Neutron Star Spirals Into the Heart of a Companion Star

My friend Norma works with the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Project – Los Alamos National Laboratory. Yesterday she sent me a super cool email with this small article from the lab, and I wanted to share it… I loved this- so very interesting! Computational science, code, stars, spirals, what’s not to love? Unfortunately, I couldn’t get to the LANL news release on this study because it required a login, but I will ask one of my parents to look this up for me. I want to see if there is more information on the computational code used to study the star collision. Hummm?

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Christmas Burst Reveals Neutron Star Collision

December 6, 2011

***********Christmas Burst, GRB 101225A; NASA*********** Goddard Space Flight Center

Old model, new data: a match made in the heavens. A strangely powerful, long-lasting gamma-ray burst on Christmas Day, 2010 has finally been analyzed to the satisfaction of a multinational research team. Called the Christmas Burst, GRB 101225A was freakishly lengthy and it produced radiation at unusually varying wavelengths. But by matching the data with a model developed in 1998, the team was able to characterize the star explosion as a neutron star spiraling into the heart of its companion star. The paper titled, “The unusual gamma-ray burst GRB 101225A from a helium star/neutron star merger at redshift 0.33,” appeared in a recent issue of the journal Nature. Christina Thöne of Spain’s Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía is the lead author, and Los Alamos computational scientist Chris Fryer is a contributor. Fryer, with the Lab’s Computer, Computational, and Statistical Sciences Division, realized that the peculiar evolution of the thermal emission (first showing X-rays with a characteristic radius of ~1011 cm followed by optical and infra-red emission at ~1014 cm) could be naturally explained by a model he and Stan Woosley of the University of California at Santa Cruz had developed in 1998. “The Helium Merger Model explained all the properties we were seeing,” Fryer said, although he noted that proving this required a series of additional computational models by the international theory team studying this “Christmas burst” and the work is still under way. Fryer is working with Wesley Even of the Los Alamos X Theoretical Design Division, using the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Simulation and Computing Codes to study the emission of this burst in more detail.
For more information, see the LANL news release.

Light It Up: Your Brain & Beauty

This article was published in the third
quarter of 2011 by ScienceDaily

Beauty Is in the Medial Orbito-Frontal Cortex of the Beholder

A region at the front of the brain ‘lights up’ when we experience beauty in a piece of art or a musical excerpt, according to new research funded by the Wellcome Trust. The study, published July 6 in the open access journal PLoS One, suggests that the one characteristic that all works of art, whatever their nature, have in common is that they lead to activity in that same region of the brain, and goes some way to supporting the views of David Hume and others that beauty lies in the beholder rather than in the object. “The question of whether there are characteristics that render objects beautiful has been debated for millennia by artists and philosophers of art but without an adequate conclusion,” says Professor Semir Zeki from the Wellcome Laboratory of Neurobiology at UCL (University College London). “So too has the question of whether we have an abstract sense of beauty, that is to say one which arouses in us the same powerful emotional experience regardless of whether its source is, for example, musical or visual. It was time for neurobiology to tackle these fundamental questions.” Twenty-one volunteers from different cultures and ethnic backgrounds rated a series of paintings or excerpts of music as beautiful, indifferent or ugly. They then viewed these pictures or listened to the music whilst lying in a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner, which measures activity in the brain.

Professor Zeki and colleague Dr Tomohiro Ishizu found that an area at the front of the brain known as the medial orbito-frontal cortex, part of the pleasure and reward centre of the brain, was more active in subjects when they listened to a piece of music or viewed a picture which they had previously rated as beautiful. By contrast, no particular region of the brain correlated generally with artwork previously rated ‘ugly,’ though the experience of visual ugliness when contrasted with the experience of beauty did correlate with activation in a number of regions. The medial orbito-frontal cortex has previously been linked to appreciation of beauty, but this is the first time that scientists have been able to show that the same area of the brain is activated for both visual and auditory beauty in the same subjects. This implies that beauty does, indeed, exist as an abstract concept within the brain. The medial orbito-frontal cortex was not the only region to be activated by beauty. As might be expected, the visual cortex, which responds to visual stimuli, was more active when viewing a painting than when listening to music, and vice versa for the auditory cortex.

However, particularly interesting was that activity in another region, the caudate nucleus, found near the centre of the brain, increased in proportion to the relative visual beauty of a painting. The caudate nucleus has been reported previously to correlate with romantic love, suggesting a neural correlate for the relationship between beauty and love. Professor Zeki adds, “Almost anything can be considered art, but we argue that only creations whose experience correlates with activity in the medial orbito-frontal cortex would fall into the classification of beautiful art. A painting by Francis Bacon, for example, may have great artistic merit but may not qualify as beautiful. The same can be said for some of the more ‘difficult’ classical composers — and whilst their compositions may be viewed as more ‘artistic’ than rock music, to someone who finds the latter more rewarding and beautiful, we would expect to see greater activity in the particular brain region when listening to Van Halen than when listening to Wagner.”

Professor Zeki was the recipient of a £1million Wellcome Trust Strategic Award in 2007 to establish a programme of research in the new field of ‘neuroaesthetics’ in search of the neural and biological basis for creativity, beauty and love. The research brings together science, the arts and philosophy to answer fundamental questions about what it means to be human.

Beauty Is in the Medial Orbito-Frontal Cortex of the Beholder- http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110706195800.htm

King Tut and Haplogroup R1b1a2

It is amazing to see the hits when one searches the information highway for stories about King Tut’s DNA. Sometime back, I discovered that the men in my paternal line share the same Y-DNA of this king. Tut’s DNA derived from Haplogroup R1b1a2. There are still a great number of people at odds over his origin, but I’ll bet most of them are not scientists!!

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Half of European Men Share King Tut’s DNA
http://af.reuters.com/article/egyptNews/idAFL3E7J135P20110801?sp=true
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Originally published on the Reuters Africa web site (8.1.2011 by Alice Baghdjian and edited by Paul Casciato)
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LONDON Aug 1 (Reuters Life!) – Up to 70 percent of British men and half of all Western European men are related to the Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun, geneticists in Switzerland said.

Scientists at Zurich-based DNA genealogy centre, iGENEA, reconstructed the DNA profile of the boy Pharaoh, who ascended the throne at the age of nine, his father Akhenaten and grandfather Amenhotep III, based on a film that was made for the Discovery Channel.

The results showed that King Tut belonged to a genetic profile group, known as haplogroup R1b1a2, to which more than 50 percent of all men in Western Europe belong, indicating that they share a common ancestor.

Among modern-day Egyptians this haplogroup contingent is below 1 percent, according to iGENEA.

“It was very interesting to discover that he belonged to a genetic group in Europe — there were many possible groups in Egypt that the DNA could have belonged to,” said Roman Scholz, director of the iGENEA Centre.

Around 70 percent of Spanish and 60 percent of French men also belong to the genetic group of the Pharaoh who ruled Egypt more than 3,000 years ago.

“We think the common ancestor lived in the Caucasus about 9,500 years ago,” Scholz told Reuters.

It is estimated that the earliest migration of haplogroup R1b1a2 into Europe began with the spread of agriculture in 7,000 BC, according to iGENEA.

However, the geneticists were not sure how Tutankhamun’s paternal lineage came to Egypt from its region of origin.

The centre is now using DNA testing to search for the closest living relatives of “King Tut”.

“The offer has only been publicised for three days but we have already seen a lot of interest,” Scholz told Reuters.

Adventure of Agent No.11: Intelligence is Never Perfect

The lecture with E.B. Held (Bruce), was jam-packed. I loved that he said that “intelligence is never perfect.” Being the lil nerd that I am, I opted for a front row seat. Held is a retired Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Agent/Clandestine Operations Officer, and has also been the Director of Intelligence at Sandia National Laboratory here in New Mexico. He is the current Director of Intelligence and Counterintelligence at the Department of Energy in Washington, D.C. Held recently published A Spy’s Guide to Santa Fe and Albuquerque, which is a history of espionage in New Mexico, and describes “the nature of a relationship with a clandestine agent.” While we were waiting for the lecture to begin, Beverly Haldiman laughed and said that the intelligence champion was likely “wearing a bullet proof vest under his suit.” I told her that he probably “had a bullet proof skull-cap implanted under his balding scalp.” When I took a photo of Held, Beverly joked that “he was gonna have to kill me,” after I snapped the shot! It was fun to laugh it up with her.

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I was anxiously awaiting this presentation, and I was impressed. Held is a very interesting person. As soon as he started speaking, I noticed that he had a difficult time breathing, and that he kept coughing. Not long after he started speaking he informed us that his lung condition was due to “years of exposure to harsh conditions.” I think the breathing problems are also directly tied to years of working in stressful, and scary conditions (maybe even his loss of hair). In all honesty, it was extremely difficult to take notes during his lecture because he delivered so much detailed information to us in a short amount of time. But in essence, here are some quotes I was able to capture.

**Held once had his “own little army.”

**He would recruit spies for the United States.

**He would have “clandestine meetings with secret agents at night in spooky places.”

**An agent needs to be careful and it “takes special planning so that people do not get executed.”

**Some questions he wanted to answer when he wrote this book— “why, where, and what was transmitted to the foreign intelligence service?”

**He said that “people spy for the U.S. because it is the right thing to do.”

**He said “the espionage that has taken place in Santa Fe has changed world history.”

**He said “espionage is about stealing intellectual property.”

**Held confirmed that “knowing other languages is very important.”

Held touched on: the history of the KGB; famous meeting sites in Santa Fe and Albuquerque; lead assassins; NOC Lists (non-official cover lists); unencrypted communication cables; compromised data; a drug store and an ice cream shop; secret exits; fooling surveillance teams; the greatest espionage meetings in history; the Manhattan Project; key brains; atomic weapons programs; national security; code names; bomb sketches; the history of text messaging; and modern espionage.

The audience included basic writers, experienced writers, authors, screenwriters, scholars, historians, an archivist , scientists, museum professionals, and IT professionals. There were several questions for Held. A woman asked “how did he get into this career?” He spoke about his father being a Deputy Director of the FBI,” which seemed to be part of the inspiration. He also said that “the CIA is looking for really smart people who can blend in as foreigners.” Then a man asked what he thought about “the Valerie Plame affair?” He kind of avoided the question by talking about Plame’s dog, her life in Santa Fe, their “CIA faces,” and then saying that he was Plame’s boss at one point. Most people who know me, will know what kind of question I asked. I asked “as the Director of Intelligence and Counterintelligence with DOE, you are certainly dealing with the issues of cyber security. You also mentioned 6 years of unencrypted data that intelligence agents successfully secured many years ago. Can you speak about how DOE is currently dealing with these issues? I think he kinda dodged my question as well (and I was a little disappointed), but in essence he said that the world has changed (which we all already know), and that the issues are being addressed in advance as much as possible before the fact. I said “strategic planning of sorts,” and he confirmed with a “yes precisely.”

At the end of his presentation, his book sold out. I actually got the last copy. When he was autographing the book I bought, he told me that I had “a great question.” Unfortunately he failed to offer a real answer… After thinking about it, I realized that I have actually heard Held speak on digital issues before. He looked familiar. It was a few years ago at either a conference or a training, but for the life of me I can’t place the actual venue. Monday I will check with two of my friends (former associates) who will remember, and than maybe I can provide an update on Held at that point.