Scientists Write Memories Directly Into Fly Brains

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"Researchers at the University of Oxford have devised a way to write memories onto the brains of flies, revealing which brain cells are involved in making bad memories. The researchers said that in flies, just 12 brain cells were responsible for what is known as 'associative learning.' They modified these neurons by adding receptors for ATP, so that the cells activate in the presence of the chemical, but since ATP isn't usually found floating around a fly's brain, the flies generally behave just like any other fly. Most interestingly, however, is that the scientists then injected ATP into the flies' brains, in a form that was locked inside a light-sensitive chemical cage. When they shined a laser on the fly brains, the ATP was released, and the 'associative learning' cells were activated. The laser flash was paired with an odor, effectively giving the fly a memory of a bad experience with the odor that it never actually had, such that it then avoided the odor in later experiments. The researchers describe their findings in the journal Cell."



For the full article check out

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8310365.stm
 
It's great... and inevitable. I just hope we eventually mature enough to use this for our own good, instead of the opposite. Last century humanity was like 3-year old kid playing with all the dangerous toys, nearly killing itself. And there's still a major mess left to be cleaned!
 
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Brainwashing may someday be much easier! Thanks, science!
 
This would be the ultimate hangover prank
 
Reminds me waaay too much of Philip K. Dick novels and short stories. That man was terribly ahead of his time, and now this--! Hello, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, and all the rest.

Although, it is cool. Just really, really dangerous in a River Tam kind of a way.
 
What they don't mention is that this was discovered entirely by accident, when the mad professor tripped over a mouldy pizza box, startling a fly who had been munching on some ATP flavoured pepperoni, who then flew angrily at him, making him poop his pants, creating a bad smell, which further irritated the fly, now hell bent on buzzing the professor to death, until he whipped out his trusty laser pen and pointed it at the fly, stunning it to the ground. Afterwards, the professor found that he never again saw this particular fly in the toilet cubicle when he needed to do a poop, so just in case his research team found out a fly had made him poop his pants, he fabricated the above experiment to prove that the fly was imagining the whole thing and that ATP flavoured pepperoni was to blame for it.
 
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