Quick Takes – Towards Genetically Engineered Catgirls: Brain Implants; Designer Chromosomes; Clever Dogs?

     Another “quick takes” on items where there is too little to say to make a complete article, but is still important enough to comment on.

     The focus this time: Inumimi Mode?

     First, a little mood music:

     Carrying on…

     Brain computer interfaces are a prerequisite for catgirl cyborgs.

“Jeffrey Keefer lay on an operating table in the oldest hospital in America surrounded by a surgical team, a group of engineers and a gaggle of spectators hoping to witness the early stages of a healthcare revolution.

“Keefer was undergoing brain surgery to relieve symptoms of Parkinson’s disease—but since his skull would be open for around four hours anyway, he had also agreed to have an experimental device called a brain-computer interface temporarily implanted.

“The unit, developed by Precision Neuroscience, sat on the surface of Keefer’s brain for 25 minutes, reading his mind. During that time, he performed a series of exercises with his hands while engineers matched his brain signals to his movements.

“The goal is to train a device that will give paralyzed patients the ability to operate a computer with their thoughts.”

     Being able to create designer chromosomes is a prerequisite for genetically engineered catgirls.

“Scientists at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine have developed a new method to create human artificial chromosomes (HACs) that could revolutionize gene therapy and other biotechnology applications. The study, published in Science, describes an approach that efficiently forms single-copy HACs, bypassing a common hurdle that has hindered progress in this field for decades.

“Artificial chromosomes are lab-made structures designed to mimic the function of natural chromosomes, the packaged bundles of DNA found in the cells of humans and other organisms. These synthetic constructs have the potential to serve as vehicles for delivering therapeutic genes or as tools for studying chromosome biology. […]

“…

“The results were stunning. Not only did the engineered HACs form successfully, but they did so with much higher efficiency compared to standard methods. Furthermore, these designer chromosomes were able to replicate and segregate properly during cell division, a key requirement for their long-term stability and functionality.”

     Of course, the goal is to create a kemonomimi, so perhaps man’s best friend would be a better starting point?

“It’s well-known that dogs can learn words for spoken commands like ‘sit,’ ‘stand’ and ‘heel.’

“But a new study has found they also can tell their ‘ball-ball’ from their ‘dolly,’ ‘teddy,’ ‘chewy’ or ‘squeaky squeak.’

“Brain scans reveal that dogs generally know that certain words stand for certain objects, researchers reported Friday in the journal Current Biology.

“Words ‘activate a memory of an object when they hear its name,’ researcher Marianna Boros of Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, Hungary, said in a news release.”

     TTFN.

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