[PhDwannabe]

Ricardo:

I think you're a little bit confused, here. These researchers are not "using a sea snail (aplysia is usually called a "sea slug," by the way) to help with memory" in the sense of some sort of supplementation--nobody's grinding up marine gastropods and serving them up to people with memory deficits. Aplysia is simply a common, well-known model lab animal, like the white rat. It's very common in neuroscience and what frequently used to be called comparative psychology (which uses animal models to study basic processes in humans). It's got a simple nervous system which we more or less have mapped, so it's used to test all kinds of hypotheses about learning in particular, both in terms of its functionality and its physiology. (In addition to being relatively few in number, the neurons of aplysia and some related species are actually really big, so it was easy to insert probes directly into them to record the firing of individual cells within the network, allowing a researcher an unusually fine-grained look at the propagation of activation between and among neurons.) Kandel's work on the cellular and molecular physiology of learning made it very well-known.

The brief snippet you found is just a press release from a university describing very loosely what some researchers are working on. It has nothing to do with anything special about the proteins in this creature being able to "help us with our memory" directly. It'll just help us because it's a useful subject species that allows us to advance scientific understanding of memory and learning. I hope that makes some sense.

[Ahsan Iqbal]

As long as you don't suffer with malnutrition, or some sort of disorder, I don't think these proteins are going to increase your efficiency in storing memory. Yes, I do realize that some substances help increase the effectiveness of a person to store memory but memory loss with old age is as natural as stiffening of joints. We might find some substance in future that can help reduce the speed with which memory weakens but to absolutely get rid of effects of old age will lead to immortality. And Immortality is not going to be achieved anytime soon, if ever.

Generally, people do mental exercises and other training to keep their brain healthy. In my opinion such exercises (accompanied with necessary nutrients) are the best way to go.

[iNow]

I implore you to try not to shutdown ideas so quickly simply because they're not yet possible, guys... I think the OP is rightly excited that we have some fantastic possibilities which can come from such work with sea snails.

As one example, what if we gathered sufficient information about the DNA that leads to these proteins in the sea snails and genetically engineer them into a human baby? Then... much like we've built a cat which can fluoresce based on genes we studied in squid, perhaps a human could be built with an outstanding memory based on genes we studied in snails... It's food for thought, anyway.

[PhDwannabe]

Quote

As long as you don't suffer with malnutrition, or some sort of disorder, I don't think these proteins are going to increase your efficiency in storing memory.

...nobody is even claiming... it's not even about...

Quote

I think the OP is rightly excited that we have some fantastic possibilities which can come from such work with sea snails.

...no...

Quote

As one example, what if we gathered sufficient information about the DNA that leads to these proteins in the sea snails and genetically engineer them into a human baby?

...these proteins aren't even important. That's not what's going on here. I think I'm going to cry.

[iNow]

Do you feel better now?

Yes, the study was about timing learning to align with activity in those proteins. That doesn't render anything I've said as invalid or any less potentially interesting.

Also, could you please do a better job at identifying the source of your quotes? You quoted two different people above, and yet the attribution is not provided. Thanks in advance.

[Ahsan Iqbal]

iNow, on 28 December 2011 - 04:22 PM, said:

I implore you to try not to shutdown ideas so quickly simply because they're not yet possible, guys...

There can be infinite number of ideas but even when we think about ideas, we have to know the limits. How about this idea that some day we would be able to plug a Solid State Drive to our brain that will store all the information permanently and the we won't have to worry about forgetting something and like a computer of today we would be able to access all of it instantaneously. Who knows, it becomes true someday. But the point is that we should present only those ideas that seem possible to the current state of thinking of the general population. After a few decades there would be ideas that we cannot even think about. Nothing is impossible but this doesn't mean that we should just start assuming and forget the era we are living in.

[iNow]

Ahsan Iqbal, on 4 January 2012 - 11:18 AM, said:

But the point is that we should present only those ideas that seem possible to the current state of thinking of the general population.

And what specific portion of the article shared by the OP do you think does not seem possible?

[Ahsan Iqbal]

iNow, on 4 January 2012 - 03:23 PM, said:

And what specific portion of the article shared by the OP do you think does not seem possible?

It was in response to "I implore you should not shutdown ideas so quickly".

[iNow]

That really does nothing to clarify your position.

[michel123456]

ricardonest, on 27 December 2011 - 06:59 PM, said:

It's a common thing you hear that when you get older, your memory starts to get worse.

It is the beginning of Alzeihmer with 3 main symptoms:
_loss of memory.
_I don't remember the 2 others.