from the we're-starting-up-the-slope dept.
A collaborative team of engineers and neuroscientists at Brown University in Providence, RI, plan to develop nanoelectronics systems to monitor brain activity. According to a press release, the group's proposal is to create a tiny device that would emit light to stimulate brain cells and record light from brain cells, analogous to a camera. Using electronic structures 500 times smaller than the width of a human hair, six Brown University professors plan to explore the function of the human brain under a $4.25-million grant from the U.S. Defense Department. And they make some interesting comments about the long term potential of their work.