March 29, 2024

Crazz Files

Exposing the Dark Truth of Our World

Inception: Scientists Have Successfully Implanted an Artificial Memory

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We thought fake news was bad enough, but now it seems that scientists have successfully implanted a fake memory in an animal, potentially leading the way to human trials.

Researchers were able to reverse-engineer a natural memory by mapping the brain circuits the memory was based on in a test mouse.

Then, they implanted this memory artificially into another mouse by stimulating its brain cells in the pattern of the original memory.

Artificial thoughts

The study, which was described in a paper published in Nature Neuroscience, shows that memories can be artificially created in the absence of any true experiences. The implanted memory was recalled by the test animal and was indistinguishable from a natural memory.

Not only does this have vast ethical implications, but it might also make us question our own memories. While it is widely known that our memories are unreliable, this new research adds a whole new dimension to the issue.

As per Scientific American, the new findings show that brain circuits that normally respond to experiences and create memories can be manipulated in order to form fake memories.

The research also provides insight into how memories are formed in the brain. This is actually part of a wider, growing scientific field that could lead to memory manipulation, transfer of memories, and even deletion of existing memories.

However, the research isn’t aimed at creating technology for an evil future dictator or scenarios from the movie Men in Black.

The scientists hope their findings will eventually help people struggling with memory impairments or people suffering from traumatic memories.

Imagine a world, where we could recover old memories, lost to time, or delete debilitating memories. This research could have resounding ethical and psychological implications if it is successful.

New findings

In the study, a natural memory was formed in mice by training them to associate a specific odor (cherry blossoms) with a foot shock. They learned to avoid this electric shock by walking to another area in their cage that was infused with a different odor (caraway).

The caraway scent was infused into the test area with a chemical called carvone, while the cherry blossom scent came from the chemical acetophenone. The researchers used acetophenone because it activates a specific type of receptor on a discrete type of olfactory sensory nerve cell.

The scientists then used optogenetics to activate the olfactory nerve cells in the mice. This sophisticated method sees surgically implanted optic fibers stimulate specific neurons in the brain via light-sensitive proteins.

In the first experiments, the researchers used transgenic animals that only produce the light-sensitive protein in acetophenone-sensitive olfactory nerves.

The scientists paired the optogenetic light stimulation of the acetophenone-sensitive olfactory nerves of the mice with the electrical foot shocks. They found that the mice then avoided the cherry blossom odor when only given the light stimulation – this suggested they had experienced the foot shock when they hadn’t.

This was an impressive step: it shows that the mice didn’t actually need to experience the odor to connect it to the electrical foot shock. Essentially, this memory could be implanted.

However, the scientists went one step further in order to craft a completely artificial memory. In order to create a truly artificial memory, they needed to remove the actual experience of being shocked for the mice.

In the latest study, the researchers showed how they employed a virus in the transgenic mice to place light-sensitive proteins in their nerve pathways. They then stimulated the olfactory nerves and the light-sensitive part of the brain with the reverse-engineered pattern.

The animals recalled the artificial memory, showing a response to an odor they had never encountered by avoiding a shock they had never received.

Mouse inception

Of course, research is in its early days. However, scientists have successfully manipulated test animals’ memories and made them recall something that they have never experienced.

What’s next? A world where we can share memories? One where we can choose what we want to remember, and what we don’t? The possibilities are frightening.

Source: https://interestingengineering.com/inception-scientists-have-successfully-implanted-an-artificial-memory

6 thoughts on “Inception: Scientists Have Successfully Implanted an Artificial Memory

  1. What,
    Into a plastic brain ??
    A dead person ??
    They have all had way too much cocaine cocktail & are blabbering wild imaginings.
    Please remember that there is at least one person on plane earth that is a fully functional human & even academically astute & she has NO CEREBRAL CORTEX.
    Also, many persons with little functional “GREY MATTER – BY ALL ACCOUNTS – WHO SHOULD NOT BE ALIVE
    So even if the above brag were true – CONSCIOUS INTELLIGENCE DOES NOT NEED A CEREBRAL CORTEX ? BRAIN.
    I’ll be back to read this with much interest.

  2. Mission Discovery:
    Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, How I Wonder What You ARe ??

    We would like to thank Dipl. – Ing. Alp Atik (member of the collaborative research center 392) for his data support concerning the quantitative methods.’
    Vienna & Germany Universities .. wow you collaborated with them wow man.

    Jeffery our former maths tutor, I hired him from Melbourne University when Andrew was at St Joseph’s College & Joseph was at Footscray City Secondary College after he transferred from Kensington Community High School, were in years 11 & 12 hIgh school.
    Jeffery also taught them CALCULOUS – I paid him & fed him & he was family.
    Jeffery’s proff. sent him to Germany all by himself to deliver a paper he had written.
    We were so proud of him.
    So where did you learn butchery ??
    Always stand tall beside your works I say.

    1. I asked Jeffery to teach them calculous – they thought it was an untouchable subject – so I said teach them & they came back with a broad smile & “is that what it is easy”
      FOR TH SHIT MATHEMATICS TEACHERS WE HAVE IN AUSTRALIA … HEY !!

      1. A brilliant mind – he took apart the alarm clock to see what was inside at 6 – left school at 13-14.
        I was afraid Jojozep Zep might do the same – displaying signs of anarchy – So I sent him to Kensington – he learned to eat fire like at the circus – foundry work – wood work – hiking – horse riding – met Premier John Cain who opened the school – plus all the the required stuff – one fine day he spat this at me, \”YOU SENT ME TO THAT SHIT SCHOOL TO BE A DUMMY\”i WAS VERY PROUD OF HIS PROGRESS AT THAT MOMENT –
        At Footscray he showed them how he could eat fire – they were in awe.
        His maths teacher did not believe he knew maths & Joe played him so well.
        In year 12 8 girls all liked him & decided to share his affections.
        He was a magnet like his mother.

          1. How ya goin with ya Spookies ??
            They wake you up at some ungodly hour to go to do wee’s & when you wash ya hands they trap you at the mirror so you can look at them for the next half hour or so – hey !!
            They love ya when they can’t get enough of ya.

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