Futurity.org » monkeys

Monkey-brained robot ‘sees’ with whiskers

Paul Mannion-Sheffield — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 22:26:02 +0000

U. SHEFFIELD (UK) — Researchers have fitted a robotic rat with a monkey brain model in order to increase the machine’s perception.

By fitting the monkey brain model into an existing robotic rat, which the University of Sheffield researchers had already developed, it was able to feel different textured surfaces, such as rough and smooth carpets, as it scuttled across them with its rat-like whiskers.

As reported in the journal Interface, the machine also made better decisions with its whiskers than any previous method tested.

Monkeys move virtual avatar with brain

Mary Jane Gore-Duke — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 15:12:01 +0000

DUKE (US) — In a first-ever demonstration of a two-way interaction between a primate brain and a virtual body, two monkeys employ brain power alone to move an avatar hand and identify the texture of virtual objects.

“Someday in the near future, quadriplegic patients will take advantage of this technology not only to move their arms and hands and to walk again, but also to sense the texture of objects placed in their hands, or experience the nuances of the terrain on which they stroll with the help of a wearable robotic exoskeleton,” says study leader Miguel Nicolelis, professor of neurobiology at Duke University.

Monkeys grasp sense of ‘me’

Patricia Donovan-Buffalo — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 12:41:54 +0000

U. BUFFALO (US) — Monkeys possess enough self-awareness to recognize that their actions can cause certain outcomes.

The findings, published in the journal Biology Letters, could have implications for people with a variety of cognitive disabilities, including autism, schizophrenia, and Alzheimer’s disease.

Monkey recall mirrors humans

Carol Clark-Emory — Mon, 02 May 2011 15:12:17 +0000

EMORY (US) — Monkeys are able to remember and reproduce simple shapes from memory, a discovery that could lead to better diagnosis and treatment of memory impairments in humans.

“Our observations of recall in Old World monkeys suggest it may have been adaptive in primates long before humans evolved, and that it does not depend on language or anything else that is uniquely human,” says Ben Basile, researcher at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Emory University.

Time on treadmill shapes up the brain

Anita Srikameswaran-Pittsburgh — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 14:52:34 +0000

“We found that monkeys who exercised regularly at an intensity that would improve fitness in middle-aged people learned to do tests of cognitive function faster and had greater blood volume in the brain’s motor cortex than their sedentary counterparts,” says Judy Cameron. “This suggests people who exercise are getting similar benefits.” (Credit: iStockphoto)

U. PITTSBURGH (US)—Adult female monkeys who ran on a treadmill for an hour a day, five days a week had increased blood flow to the brain and learned faster than inactive monkeys.

That finding comes from the first study to examine the relationship between exercise, learning, and brain blood flow in a non-human primate model. The results are available in the journal Neuroscience.

Monkeys like to mix it up

Karl Bates-Duke — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 15:17:04 +0000

New research shows that capuchin monkeys prefer variety for variety’s sake and are willing to eat food they like less to satisfy their desire for variety. The implications of this simple experiment shed some light on consumer behavior, Dan Ariely says. Above, capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella) sharing a food treat. (Credit: Frans de Waal/Wikimedia Commons)

DUKE (US)—Given a choice between spending a token to get their absolute favorite food or spending it to have a choice from a buffet of options, capuchin monkeys will opt for variety.

In fact, they’ll even eat a less-preferred food from that buffet when the favorite food is on it. They choose variety for variety’s sake.

Monkey brain signals mental wanderlust

Futurity-Jenny Leonard — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 22:21:30 +0000

Researchers looked at how nerve cells fired in a part of the brain known as the posterior cingulate cortex when the monkeys were offered a selection of rewards. When the monkeys decided to explore new alternatives, the neurons, for the most part, fired more strongly. (Credit: Muhammad Mahdi Karim)

DUKE (US)—Knowing when to stay with what’s familiar or when to search for something new can be tricky, especially for those with conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease. Using brain scans, researchers are able to predict when monkeys will switch from exploiting a known resource to exploring their options.

“Humans aren’t the only animals who wonder if the grass is greener elsewhere, but it’s hard to abandon what we know in hopes of finding something better,” explains John Pearson, research associate of neurobiology at Duke University and the study’s lead author.

Gene therapy has monkeys seeing red (and green)

Futurity-Jenny Leonard — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 19:03:26 +0000

The natural habitat of the squirrel monkey is the rainforest canopy. This is a young male in the Brazilian Amazon. All male squirrel monkeys are red-green color blind but the majority of females have trichromatic color vision.

U. WASHINGTON (US)—Color blindness in adult monkeys has been cured using gene therapy, according to researchers at the University of Washington.