GAINESVILLE, Fla. --- A University of Florida scientist has
grown a living "brain" that can fly a simulated plane, giving
scientists a novel way to observe how brain cells function as a
network. 'Brain' In A Dish Acts As Autopilot, Living Computer
University of Florida researcher Thomas DeMarse holds a glass
dish on October 12, 2004, containing a brain -- a living network
of 25,000 rat brain cells connected to an array of 60 electrodes
that can interact with a computer to fly a simulated F-22
fighter plane. During this interaction, scientists can observe
how the neurons communicate as a network, and send and respond
to signals from the computer and each other, in an effort to
understand and model the computational power of the brain.
(University of Florida/Ray Carson) The "brain" -- a collection
of 25,000 living neurons, or nerve cells, taken from a rat's
brain and cultured inside a glass dish -- gives scientists a
unique real-time window into the brain at the cellular level. By
watching the brain cells inter