Creating the brain and interacting with the brain: an integrated approach to understanding the brain

In the past two decades, brain science and robotics have made gigantic advances in their own fields, and their interactions have generated several interdisciplinary research fields. First, in the ‘understanding the brain by creating the brain’ approach, computational neuroscience models have been applied to many robotics problems. Second, such brain-motivated fields as cognitive robotics and developmental robotics have emerged as interdisciplinary areas among robotics, neuroscience and cognitive science with special emphasis on humanoid robots. Third, in brain–machine interface research, a brain and a robot are mutually connected within a closed loop. In this paper, we review the theoretical backgrounds of these three interdisciplinary fields and their recent progress. Then, we introduce recent efforts to reintegrate these research fields into a coherent perspective and propose a new direction that integrates brain science and robotics where the decoding of information from the brain, robot control based on the decoded information and multimodal feedback to the brain from the robot are carried out in real time and in a closed loop.     

Tunneling Conductance Dependence of the Tunneling Spectra in Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8

We have measured the tunneling spectra in Bi₂Sr₂CaCu₂O₈ with a scanning tunneling microscope(STM) at various tip-sample distances by changing the tunneling conductance in a controlled manner. When the tunneling conductance is increased from 1×10^–9 to 1×10^–5 S, the spectra do not show changes in particular. However, the gap value decreases steeply and the asymmetric back ground density of states turns inverted V-shaped one above 6×10^–4 S. The changes in the tunneling spectra at the high tunneling conductances are explained by the enhancement of the local carrier density induced by the pressure that the STM tip applied to the sample.     

An optical instrumentation using a sensor with a sensordummyagainst noises on sensor and transmission line

This short paper discusses the method of effectively canceling equal status normal mode noise not only on a sensor line but also on a transmission line of an optical instrument using a sensor with a sensordummy resistance     

High performance of silicided silicon-sidewall source and drain (S4D) structure

A silicided silicon-sidewall source and drain (S⁴D) structure is proposed for sub-0.1-μm devices. The merit of the S⁴D structure is that the series resistance of the source and drain is significantly reduced since the silicide layer is attached very close to the gate electrode and the silicon sidewall can be doped very highly. Thus, very high drain current drive can be expected, Another advantage of this structure is that the source and drain extensions are produced by the solid-phase diffusion of boron from the highly doped silicon-sidewall. Thus, shallow extensions with very high doping can be realized. A 75-nm gate length pMOSFET fabricated with this structure is shown to exhibit excellent electrical characteristics     

热压/热变形Nd2Fe14B/α-Fe纳米双相永磁体的研究

为了制备各向异性块状Nd2Fe14B／α—Fe纳米双相永磁体，研究了热压／热变形工艺参数与样品微观组织结构、磁性能之间的关系。结果表明，饱和磁化强度Js随模压温度的升高而提高；而剩磁Jr、内禀矫顽力Hcj和最大磁能积(BH)max开始都随模压温度的升高而上升，但超过一定温度后反而降低；同时提高热压压力会使磁性能增加，而热变形温度对磁性能影响很小。热变形后样品垂直于压力方向的磁性能略高于平行于压力方向，呈现出轻微的各向异性。Nd2Fe14B／α—Fe纳米双相永磁材料在热压／热变形后没有产生晶粒的择优长大，在晶体学上仍然是各向同性的。     

Establishment time of liquid flow in a bath agitated by bottom gas injection

The establishment time of gas-liquid two-phase flows in a cylindrical bath agitated by bottom gas injection through a central single-hole bottom nozzle was investigated. Because the turbulence intensity in the bath was comparable to or larger than the unity, the conventional definition of the flow establishment time based on the history of mean velocity was not suitable for the present case. In fact, it was difficult to determine the flow establishment time based on the well-known 90 or 99 pct criterion for the mean velocity. Accordingly, two methods of determining the flow establishment time by focusing on the turbulence components instead of the mean velocity components were proposed. Velocity measurements were made with a two-channel laser Doppler velocimeter. The flow establishment time was correlated as a function of gas flow rate. Close agreement was obtained by the two methods.     

Substitution of an aspartic acid results in constitutive activation of c-kit receptor tyrosine kinase in a rat tumor mast cell line RBL-2H3

The c-kit protooncogene encodes a receptor tyrosine kinase that mediates signals required for differentiation, proliferation and survival of mast cells. We have already shown the constitutive activation of c-kit receptor tyrosine kinase (KIT) in a human mast cell leukemia line (HMC-1) and a murine mastocytoma cell line (P-815). We here examined whether such constitutive activation of KIT occurred in the rat tumor mast cell line RBL-2H3 as well, which is frequently used as a tool for studying functions of mast cells. In RBL-2H3 cells, KIT was constitutively phosphorylated on tyrosine and activated in the absence of autocrine production of its ligand, stem cell factor (SCF). Sequencing analysis revealed that one of c-kit genes of RBL-2H3 cells had a point mutation, resulting in amino acid substitution of Tyr for Asp in codon 817. When rat wild-type c-kit cDNA and mutant-type c-kit cDNA encoding KITTyr817 were transfected into cells of a human embryonic kidney cell line (293T), only mutant form KITTyr817 was constitutively phosphorylated on tyrosine and activated in the absence of SCF. Since mutations at the same Asp codon constitutively activated KIT in all the human HMC-1, murine P-815, and rat RBL-2H3 cell lines, and since the incorporation of antisense oligonucleotides of c-kit messenger RNA significantly suppressed the proliferation of RBL-2H3 cells, the activating mutations in the Asp codon of the c-kit gene appeared to be involved in neoplastic growth of mast cells.     

Strain analysis of moving objects using a Fourier transform grid method

There is no good method to measure the shape and the strain distributions of a structure changing with time. We have previously proposed the Fourier transform grid method (FTGM) to measure the three-dimensional shape and surface strain distributions of stationary objects by analysing the two-dimensional grating images recorded with two cameras. In the stereoscopic method, it is very important to determine the accurate geometric parameters of the camera system. In this paper, the positions and the directions of cameras are accurately determined using the FTGM applied to images of a reference object on which a two-dimensional grating is drawn. Applications for analysing shape and strain distributions of vibrating rubber plates and a moving human skin are shown.     

Stabilization of bioethanol recovery with silicone rubber‐coated ethanol‐permselective silicalite membranes by controlling the pH of acidic feed solution

In order to produce highly concentrated bioethanol by pervaporation using an ethanol‐permselective silicalite membrane, techniques to suppress adsorption of succinic acid, which is a chief by‐product of ethanol fermentation and causes the deterioration in pervaporation performance, onto the silicalite crystals was investigated. The amount adsorbed increased as the pH of the aqueous succinic acid solution decreased. The pervaporation performance also decreased with decreasing pH when the ternary mixtures of ethanol/water/succinic acid were separated. Using silicalite membranes individually coated with two types of silicone rubber, pervaporation performance was significantly improved in the pH range of 5 to 7, when compared with that of non‐coated silicalite membranes in ternary mixtures of ethanol/water/succinic acid. Moreover, when using a silicalite membrane double‐coated with the two types of silicone rubber, pervaporation performance was stabilized at lower pH values. In the separation of bioethanol by pervaporation using the double‐coated silicalite membrane, removal of accumulated substances having an ultraviolet absorption maximum at approximately 260 nm from the fermentation broth proved to be vital for efficient pervaporation. Copyright © 2005 Society of Chemical Industry