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Biotech / Medical : Biotech Valuation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Biomaven who wrote (7850)	2/10/2003 7:49:42 PM
From: tom pope	Respond to of 52153

One comment only, absolutely no problem if people could limit themselves to OT articles as interesting as that one. Even Dilbert is on to this issue, if you happen to follow him.

To: Biomaven who wrote (7850)	2/10/2003 9:58:04 PM
From: Robohogs	Respond to of 52153

Thank goodness - there is hope for me after all, both mentally and emotionally. Thank you Peter. You have made my day. LOL Jon P.S. Keep up the posts. P.S.S. The concerns in the article are the main reason I have been against most anti-depressants and Ritalin. Normal is not the same emotional response from everyone. Normal is a little bit of crazy. I cannot imagine what it must have been like for John Nash to lose his creativity on lithium(?).

To: Biomaven who wrote (7850)	2/10/2003 10:04:45 PM
From: Biomaven	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 52153

By the way, that article's mention of Ritalin vs. Prozac reminds me of a cartoon I thought up a few years ago: A very sad Piglet is complaining to Christopher Robin: "Things just aren't the same around here ever since they put Eeyore on Prozac and Tigger on Ritalin." I actually saw a real cartoon a few years later with the Eeyore half of this gag. Peter P.S. My hidden ambition is to be a New Yorker cartoon gag writer. <g>

To: Biomaven who wrote (7850)	2/11/2003 1:07:06 AM
From: Doc Bones	Respond to of 52153

Infineon Builds Chip to Read Brain Cell Signals You started it, Peter. ;-) I'd normally post this in Biotech News. A thread for OT but biotech-related items, that are not primarily news, could be useful. p.s. I tend to reverse convention and put the main item in regular print, my comments in italics, because I find the italics a bit harder to read for longer items. Doc By REUTERS Filed at 0:21 a.m. ET SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Researchers at Infineon Technologies AG in Germany have developed new semiconductor technology that will allow scientists to read electrical signals in living nerve cells, the company said on Tuesday. Being able to read and record the signals, with the aid of computers, will help scientists better understand how the brain works and could eventually lead to treatments for neurological diseases, like Alzheimer's, said Roland Thewes, senior director in corporate research at Munich-based Infineon. ``For example, you could put slices from brain nerve cells on the chip, apply drugs and see how the nerve signals'' and cells react to a particular drug, he said in an interview. Infineon researchers worked with scientists at the Max Planck Institute, located outside Munich, on the new biosensor chip, dubbed the ``Neuro-Chip.'' In a paper being presented on Tuesday at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference, Thewes and colleagues detail how they successfully recorded electrical signals in neurons from the brains of snails. Neurons are the specialized cells that make up the nervous system in living organisms and communicate with each other through electrical pulses. The Neuro-Chip, about the size of a fingernail, has 16,000 sensors that monitor electrical pulses in cells submerged in electrolyte nutrient fluid that coats the semiconductor and keeps the neurons alive, Thewes said. Amplifiers embedded in the circuitry enable each sensor to detect and process the low voltage signals throughout the different cell layers. The data can then be transmitted to a computer and eventually transformed into a color picture for analysis. Currently, researchers use microscopic needles to measure the electrical activity inside, which shortens the life of the cell, preventing study over a period of time and without the accuracy of the Neuro-Chip, Thewes said. nytimes.com