Time Spike

THE DEADLIEST PREDATORS OF THREE SEPARATE EONS Captain Andy Blacklock was overseeing the change of shifts at the state of Illinois' maximum-security prison when the world outside was suddenly ripped. They thought it was an earthquake until they found that the Mississippi River had disappeared, along with all signs of civilization. Then the sun came up¾in the wrong direction. And a dinosaur came by and scratched its hide against the wall of the prison ... Something had thrown the prison back in time millions of years. And they were not alone. Other humans from periods centuries, even millennia, apart had also been dropped into the same time. Including a band of murderous conquistadores. But the prison had its own large population of murderers. They couldn't be turned loose, but what else could be done with them. Death walked outside the walls, human savagery was planning to break loose inside, and Stephens and the other men and women of the prison's staff were trapped in the middle. At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).

Solid and transparent data analysis is the most important basis for reliable interpretation of experiments. The technique of parallel spike train recordings using multi-electrode arrangements has been available for many decades now, but only recently gained wide popularity among electro physiologists. Many traditional analysis methods are based on firing rates obtained by trial-averaging, and some of the assumptions for such procedures to work can be ignored without serious consequences. The situation is different for correlation analysis, the result of which may be considerably distorted if certain critical assumptions are violated. The focus of this book is on concepts and methods of correlation analysis (synchrony, patterns, rate covariance), combined with a solid introduction into approaches for single spike trains, which represent the basis of correlations analysis. The book also emphasizes pitfalls and potential wrong interpretations of data due to violations of critical assumptions.

First Time in Paperback for This Time-Travel Adventure by a New York Times Best-Selling Author. Captain Andrew Blacklock was overseeing the change of shifts at the state of Illinois’ maximum-security prison when the world outside was suddenly ripped. They thought it was an earthquake until they found that the Mississippi river had disappeared, along with all signs of civilization. Then the sun came up—in the wrong direction. And a dinosaur came by and scratched its hide against the wall of the prison . . . Something had thrown the prison back in time millions of years. And they were not alone. Other humans from periods centuries, even millennia apart had also been dropped into the same time. Including a band of murderous conquistadores. But the prison had its own large population of murderers. They couldn’t be turned loose, but what else could be done with them? Death walked outside the walls, human savagery was planning to break loose inside, and Stephens and the other men and women of the prison’s staff were trapped in the middle.

Hebb's postulate provided a crucial framework to understand synaptic alterations underlying learning and memory. Hebb's theory proposed that neurons that fire together, also wire together, which provided the logical framework for the strengthening of synapses. Weakening of synapses was however addressed by "not being strengthened", and it was only later that the active decrease of synaptic strength was introduced through the discovery of long-term depression caused by low frequency stimulation of the presynaptic neuron. In 1994, it was found that the precise relative timing of pre and postynaptic spikes determined not only the magnitude, but also the direction of synaptic alterations when two neurons are active together. Neurons that fire together may therefore not necessarily wire together if the precise timing of the spikes involved are not tighly correlated. In the subsequent 15 years, Spike Timing Dependent Plasticity (STDP) has been found in multiple brain brain regions and in many different species. The size and shape of the time windows in which positive and negative changes can be made vary for different brain regions, but the core principle of spike timing dependent changes remain. A large number of theoretical studies have also been conducted during this period that explore the computational function of this driving principle and STDP algorithms have become the main learning algorithm when modeling neural networks. This Research Topic will bring together all the key experimental and theoretical research on STDP.

Neuronal communication forms the basis for all behavior, from the smallest movement to our grandest thought processes. Among the many mechanisms that support these functions, spike timing is among the most powerful and-until recently-perhaps the least studied. In the last two decades, however, the study of spike timing has exploded. The heightened

The Adventures of Spike & Jeremiah touches on the power of imagination in children. This book highlights the relationship between a young boy and his reptile as they discover the wonders of the world by incorporating art, friendship, and wonder.

The story of a neural impulse and what it reveals about how our brains work We see the last cookie in the box and think, can I take that? We reach a hand out. In the 2.1 seconds that this impulse travels through our brain, billions of neurons communicate with one another, sending blips of voltage through our sensory and motor regions. Neuroscientists call these blips “spikes.” Spikes enable us to do everything: talk, eat, run, see, plan, and decide. In The Spike, Mark Humphries takes readers on the epic journey of a spike through a single, brief reaction. In vivid language, Humphries tells the story of what happens in our brain, what we know about spikes, and what we still have left to understand about them. Drawing on decades of research in neuroscience, Humphries explores how spikes are born, how they are transmitted, and how they lead us to action. He dives into previously unanswered mysteries: Why are most neurons silent? What causes neurons to fire spikes spontaneously, without input from other neurons or the outside world? Why do most spikes fail to reach any destination? Humphries presents a new vision of the brain, one where fundamental computations are carried out by spontaneous spikes that predict what will happen in the world, helping us to perceive, decide, and react quickly enough for our survival. Traversing neuroscience’s expansive terrain, The Spike follows a single electrical response to illuminate how our extraordinary brains work.

In the analysis of neruronal spike data, the spike occurrence histogram and the interspike interval histogram are frequently computed. Both of these computations are derived independently from the raw data. In a previous report, it was shown that under certain conditions, the interspike interval histogram can be derived directly from the spike occurrence histogram. The report provides the complete mathematical details of this derivation. The predictive ability of the derived equation is demonstrated using computer-simulated data and with actual neurophysiological data. In all of these cases, the agreement between the predicted and empirical results satisfied chi-square goodness-of-fit criteria at the 95% confidence level. (Author)