“EyeWire is a game to map the brain from the Seung Lab at MIT. Anyone can play and you need no scientific background. Over 130,000 people from 145 countries play. Together we are mapping the 3D structure of neurons; advancing our quest to understand ourselves.”

I have started playing this game to learn more about the structure of neurons as well as how best to implement citizen science.  I have created this set of posts which I am using to capture 1- My scores 2- Chat conversations and 3- Ideas on how to better motivate game players (eyewirers) 4- How to apply what I learn about playing the game…. more

By joining EyeWire, you can help map the connectome, starting with connections between retinal neurons. EyeWire gameplay advances neuroscience by helping researchers discover how neurons connect and network to process information. You also help the EyeWire team, based at MIT, develop advanced artificial intelligence and computational technologies for mapping the connectome.

Sebastian Seung’s blog post Play EyeWire and Contribute to Neuroscience Research at MIT Introductory Tutorials on YouTube Wikipedia Entry

Nice summary by Times-Tribune reporter, Kevin O’Neill, who actually tried ...

Image and quote below from Google Earth Hubble Telescope Showcase here.  Amazing photographs!

“Launched into orbit in 1990, NASA’s Hubble Telescope has revolutionized astronomy and inspired a generation with its magnificent views of the universe. To celebrate Hubble’s 20th Birthday, we’ve teamed up with our friends at the Space Telescope Science Institute to share our 20 favorite Hubble images. Browse the images below, watch this tour video, or in Google Earth and fly to these locations in space!”

Mason News May 22, 2013 by Michele McDonald

Renowned neuroscientist Giorgio Ascoli is working on another complexity related to the brain — how to handle the massive amount of data researchers are creating on a near-daily basis.

Neuroscientist Giorgio AscoliCreative Services photo

The George Mason University researcher is the lead investigator on a grant from the prestigious National Academies Keck Futures Initiative that is a step toward giving researchers another tool in their work. It’s a data overload worth organizing because, as Ascoli points out, such a “knowledge base” could reveal patterns, show untapped areas for future research and cut duplication.

“You identify what you do not know,” says Ascoli, who is a University Professor in the Molecular Neuroscience Department and the founding director of the Center for Neural Informatics, Structures and Plasticity at the Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study. “You also create a map of what is known and what is not known.”

The knowledge base for brain data dovetails with the White House’s recent BRAIN Initiative. “The BRAIN Initiative is trying to do with the brain what the Human Genome Project did with genes,” Ascoli says.

Researchers are hard at work publishing scores of articles in hundreds of journals ...

Recommended and post by KurzweilAI net

The brain bank science blog (by a group of Manchester, UK-based scientists) has posted 12 images from 2013 that are as much fantastic works of art as neuroscience. Shown here: “Brainbow,” a transgenic system designed to label different types of brain cells in a festive panoply of colors.  More

(Credit: Cai et al. Nature Methods)