Max Perutz Science Writing Award 2009

Tonight I have been pleasantly surprised to have been awarded a Highly Commended prize at the Max Perutz Science Writing Award, sponsored by the MRC. I got to spend a lovely night in the Gherkin, where we drank good wine, ate delicious food and, thanks to the DJ, danced a bit of Tango! Thanks also to the MRC for organising a Master Class on writing with poet Lavinia Greenlaw and the Guardian's science journalist Alok Jha.

The essay below is considerably more down to earth and less philosophical than my previous entry, though I hope it still is able to convey my amazement at the phenomena we call vision and consciousness.

Memories of a brain cartographer

Look. The world before you seems simple. It almost appears as though, somewhere inside your head, a cinema projector displays what your eyes capture and interpret. But that's not how we function. Instead, your brain is a cartographer, housing on its cortex a multitude of sensory, mostly visual, maps. Like regular maps, brain maps are drawn in a continuous and fluid way. Just as neighbouring countries are placed adjacent on a map, neurones that respond to similar visual locations are also grouped together.

Depending on the task at hand, our brains pick the best map to get the job done. When we talk about the Earth, depending on the context we interpret it in terms of political, geographical or weather maps, each with its rules and highlights. Just like a map maker, the brain interprets the world surrounding us by simplifying it: it splits it into categories, uses landmarks, and traces frontiers.

Over a dozen maps have recently been found in humans, spread about the brain's cortex. Some maps detect the edges and corners that delineate the outlines of objects. Others only take heed of movement or colour. Another few just seem to predict where you'll soon lay your eyes. Still others are centred on where your eyes are pointed, or relate to the position of your head or hands.

So, that variety is fascinating, but what does this add to science? Well, much of current brain science focusses on labelling a particular brain region with some function. Research programmes often try to find the "centre" for, say, envy, face perception or motivation. Remarkably few have actually explored how the brain manages to map and co-ordinate itself, that is, how it actually works.

My research focusses on learning more about visual maps, especially how they interact with attention and memory. Both are central to actual perception; for example, as you read this line you "see" the ones above and below, but ignore them; and if you close your eyes you'll find it hard to recall items around the paper or screen you read this from.

To find visual maps I use an fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging) scanner to obtain 3D images of brain activity through time, while volunteers perform a visual task. In one such task, participants look at a computer screen split into sectors, each sector filled with a pattern of waves changing in shape with time and disappearing. Their job is to pay attention to and then remember the patterns in some places while ignoring the rest. Then, I extract two different results. One contains the hot spots of activation during the attention and memory periods. The other, using a fairly new technique, finds chunks of brain where the pattern, not the general level, of activity, varies depending on the spatial location of stimulation.

In this way, I found that the occipital cortex, in the back of the head, showed much map-like activity when volunteers both paid attention to the visual stimuli and kept them active in memory. Interestingly, during the memory period the maps in occipital cortex were not active overall, but only subtly changed their pattern of activation. On the other hand, maps in parietal cortex, at the top and back of the brain, could be detected only during the attention period. Curiously, these same areas showed very high activation during memory, despite displaying no map-like responses.

The benefit of this increased knowledge becomes clear when we look at cases of brain damage that result in some form of visual deficit. Patients with blindsight are effectively blind, but can learn to navigate the environment. Visual neglect, on the other hand, affects attention such that patients can "see" but simply don't notice things happening in half of their visual field. Individuals with optic ataxia can describe how objects look, but find it impossible to interact with them. In contrast, those with visual agnosia are unable to name or describe objects, but can grasp them perfectly.

Many such syndromes can be better understood and treated if we know the precise properties of both the damaged and intact visual maps. We could guide rehabilitation by taking advantage of the plasticity of the brain. We might, thus, stimulate the activity of intact visual maps that communicate with the damaged ones, helping reactivate and regenerate them. This research hints at ways we might "encourage" brain cortexes to do this.

Even as my results add to our knowledge, though, they raise more questions. Why do brain areas sometimes act as maps and other times not? How do maps work when they are inactive? Much work remains to be done, but many benefits remain to be reaped. Still, one thing we can say for certain: there's much more to vision than meets the eye.

Independent/Bosch Technology Horizons essay... third time lucky?

As a friend of mine said, "Its all getting a bit predictable!" after having previously won and being Highly Commended. Having written my third essay for the Independent/Bosch Technology Horizons Award, answering the question "How can technology and engineering provide innovative solutions to today's global challenges?", I have been one the 14 (out of 545 entries) short-listed students for the 2009 prize. I was happily surprised to find out that I won 2nd prize, meaning I've collected all 3! A pity for me, and a boon for the younger generation, it is that I'm now too old to participate in the contest again... I think. Stand by for next year ;-)

UPDATE: To read previous winning and 2nd place essays by the various contestants in recent years, check out the new Bosch Technology Horizons site!

"Waste not want not

Climate change: our direst global challenge. The media preaches manifold solutions, including the well-worn emphasis on renewable energy sources and status quo approaches like "clean coal". Technology has endowed us with god-like powers of geoengineering: we can either help nature, by infusing iron into oceans to proliferate carbon-absorbing plankton, or bypass nature by floating lenses in space to reflect the Sun - a modern-day Perseus' shield.

This is all very well. But so long as it evades the underlying problem, our entire approach remains misguided. Climate change is one symptom of our society's affliction: its vampiric lust for energy. There's no denying that climate change must be prevented, but if we don't attack its root cause our efforts remain in vain. Here's where engineering comes in handy. It's not simply the tools it provides, but the philosophy it embodies. Engineering is all about efficiency - using just enough resources to solve a problem, and doing it well to boot. In recent years, researchers have realised we waste much of the extracted energy before using it. That's why an engineer's mindset is so beneficial to scientific research. Let's see how...

Even as we liberate the energy latent in light, wind and tides, much of it is lost. At times when the supply of generated energy exceeds the moment's demand, conventional batteries cannot effectively store the excess. Often the problem is that we store energy in an inefficient form. Think, "what is cheaper and simpler, my thermos or my laptop battery?" Terry Murphy, CEO of SolarReserve has put this simple idea to use in solar thermal plants, by storing energy as heat in molten salt until it is needed to create electricity. A similar approach, useful for wind turbines, is the use of flywheels which store rotational energy by increasing their speed of rotation, then release it back as they slow down.

Photovoltaic solar plants, however, can't afford these solutions, since they produce electricity directly. By way of solution, Donald Sadoway at MIT has developed a cheap and efficient liquid battery, in which energy is stored as metal ions, then freed when the ions fuse into an electrolyte. But perhaps the most promising method is one inspired by photosynthesis: professor Daniel Nocera of MIT has happened upon a holy grail of chemistry - an efficient catalyst to split water into oxygen and hydrogen, the latter of which can be burned to run our car or used in a fuel cell. Importantly, this process does not need a large infrastructure, so every household could manufacture its own fuel.

Speaking of households, new technologies will avoid waste here too. A breakthrough by MIT researchers Byoungwoo Kang and Gerbrand Ceder, speeds the tunnelling of lithium ions inside batteries. This means much higher speeds of recharging, allowing a mobile phone to charge within 10 seconds, and an electric car in 5 minutes. This simple development could effectively eliminate the energy waste from chargers being left on overtime.

A quite different solution is necessary for the PC, an energy hog in our age of constant Internet access. Companies like CherryPal propose a shift towards "cloud computing", where the bulk of processing power is distributed and accessed by many users from individual home terminals. These terminals are simple, integrated and ecological machines that avoid energy waste. However, their connection to the cloud can provide scalable processing power depending on our needs - from web browser to supercomputer.

Yet another way to conserve energy mirrors the thermos example described above. Recent improvements in the manufacture of aerogel, a powerful insulating material, mean it could be affordable enough for use in utilities, such as fridges and ovens, and even in construction. This means we could keep the right places in our houses cold and warm using far less energy. Given that buildings cause over a third of carbon emissions, this becomes a very attractive proposal.

Another big spender is lighting, since our addiction to incandescent bulbs burns one whole fifth of the energy we produce. LED bulbs, similar in usability to incandescents, use some 30 times less energy and have a lifespan 100 times longer, but their price has made them prohibitive. Until recently, that is: a new advance by Colin Humphreys of Cambridge University allows LEDs to be manufactured en masse on silicone wafers instead of the typical sapphire, at a fraction of the usual cost.

In the light of these advances, reducing our carbon footprint is a piece of cake: all we need is to learn how to slice our cake more thinly! When it comes to tackling the challenges ahead, the old proverb is right: "waste not, want not"."

Taut Tangos

Standing before the bleak gate, I saw no sign nor heard noise that would betray a hint of commotion within. Without, the night held in its airs a sort of agitated yet limp festivity: behind me, in an inner court crowned by a fountain, young men and women wandered vaguely, stirred into Brownian motion by spirits and sexual tension.

The ghost of sensual grace lingered there all the while enveloping the columns that held the balconies above me suspended in the burdened air. The shadows of those pillars, hence, resembled the svelte figure of the Flamenco dancer that had infused so much presence into the then quiet plaza. The towering terrace above took me under its wing, shielded me from the unnatural light of street lamps, and muffled the sound of senseless murmurs. I extended a night-cloaked hand and hissed a call.

Once.

Twice.

Thrice.

The hive replied with a buzz. The door gave way to cautiously curious fingertips. Within, a stony staircase rose like smoke, ethereal rock. Step by step, the stairs breathed me upwards to the light, like a moth. Out it streamed from the threshold, solidifying not only the stairwell but also the sense of music. The warm, textured sounds slid along the walls and floor, perspiring into my shoes. Like grit it was, hot sand stinging my feet, giving me agony for each instant stood still, bound by boots of Spanish leather.

I strode through, past the oaken door, past mirrors and fedoras, past Gauchos and Catalanes. I stepped into the royal chamber, where the Tangueros moved and spoke the tongue of turning bodies, shaking to the Milonga's beat like bees. The tiled floor, whose flowery regularity scented each tread taken, extended but a handful feet in each direction. A box of sardines where a dozen couples slid like fish past one another and past an impromptu audience waiting for their turn to enter the play.

I lost little time, instead losing myself in the communal embrace, letting the pleasantly poisoned music sting deep into my ear.

Tacit dancer

Her dark figure grew from the ground up, a shade liberated from the confines of surface. Her stance was a silent dance, motionless, yet stating intent, a stifled shout: "Flamenco!" Her face was aged, yet of timeless beauty:

Half moon eyes - the inverse smiles of samurai masks. The slender, sharp nose sliced the air she breathed, a blade hung over her fine mouth, wide and stern guarding a voice deep and sensuous, of musky tones, textured like white birch bark. Her hair, knotted into a tense bun, more than embraced her scalp, nigh permeating it even, the black ink of an epopee twisted and condensed beyond sense.

What darker threads of thought hid beneath? I imagined their ebony silk boil into sung voice as passion burnt them, leaving only the ash of memory. She did not rummage through the pale flakes of feeling, but instead tamed desire by becoming more obscure than its object, unfathomable to temptation and fate.

As dark stars absorb all light about themselves, so she had drained the light of day to herself, leaving the rest of the square in darkness to my eyes. Only later did I take notice of her escort, a man of ample chest and weathered, rocky face. His apparent prowess was tempered by his meek demeanour, such that side by side the two companions appeared disparate yet inexorably bound: like the King and Queen of a graceful chess set, like Lord and Lady Macbeth, like Mathieu and Conchita...

Silverback

A living image of the one who is Silverback, yet charcoal heart, burning...

Broken glass

Years ere, I had a Nightmare, a most unpleasant affair. Indeed, a nightmare with capital letter, for the usual nightmare is rather interesting. The latter turns the misty matter of dream more solid, more living, and sharper than sentient existence. But Nightmare is something else, it is the sweat soaking your face in the morning, the tremor of tendons as fingers sweep sand out of dilated eyes. Nightmare is a dream too frighteningly real, one that threatens to overthrow stable reality to let reign the pandemonium of reverie. Fear comes from feeling that your existence is perhaps confined to the realm of the looking glass, and the smirking face behind the mirror gloats over your stolen freedom...

That morning I had been thus caged in Nightmare, not by iron bars, but by the vast, barren landscape that stretched before me and across infinity as a tired god on a cloudy bed. The whiteness of the endless plane bred madness in my mind as my eyes turned drunk with bare absence. I floated, shapeless and incorporeal, an eyeless observer to the scenes that would unfold in that timeless limbo. Both my being and senses were ensnared, unable to deviate but for one instant, locked into place by dread and anticipation.

Suddenly, an image manifested, as though it had always been there: a young woman, bare and beautiful, sprinted towards the glass screen separating her and me. She leaped through the wall and, as though Time blinked during the impact, appeared on the other side. She crouched on the floor unharmed, almost foetal in her mien, her head bowed not low enough to masquerade the fairness of her face. But then another blink, this time in the eyes of Chance, and where she had been, a bloody pool extended on the plane. Horror shook my sleeping body as I felt, more than saw, her body entire torn by the sharp shards of crystal. Both images stood waiting, languishing in my eyes as consciousness attempted vainly to refuse them passage. Both seen at once, yet separate, as though Fate held its trumps in hand, a sadistic player who out of spite refuses to play a card. Death and life clasped in one cruel fist...

the kind Dragon, the alabaster Tower and the lone Raven

It is a little know fact that Dragons are not malefic. Their breath, licked by flurrying tongues of flame, serves not only the combustion of the flesh, but gives theirs life. Dragon's blood is made of rubies, molten and pushed by their mighty hearts, each beat sending the blaze of life to their very fingertips where it dances round and about, almost leaving their hands as a halo of healing force. If a Dragon surrounds you in his colossal hand, fear nothing, his sweat may burn but not harm, drink up and your sadness shall shatter and, as tiny droplets of mist do, give rise to rainbow.

We've cheated much these gentle creatures, in search of the treasures they keep within and not without, for, contrary to legend, they search no riches for themselves. It is us greedy ghouls who, craving their blood, take up arms against these noble behemoths and leech their sap, plunder their passion, let it run and crystallize into empty, listless stones. So you see, the Basilisk has human form, our so called heroes make up the Medusa, each a serpent grown on the head of covetousness, while our fond villains, unlike Perseus, possess no polished shields, no mirrors. But perhaps one can't deflect this gaze no more, so much amassed urge that it has condensed to two black holes that swallow worlds entire.

You will ask, how can these leviathans fall prey to our puny assails? The reasons are rather simple: Dragons cannot but be kind. The irrational heat within them never turns to inferno, but always tender, rises up to their eyes, making their vision ruddy, wholesome. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. Indeed, each flame that leaves their mouth is a piece from the mosaic of their soul that they pledge, pawn even, to invigorate our fading Earth. And though we are to them but mosquitoes, our swords but harmless trunks, it is our poisonous hatred and greed which disease and ravage their bodies for the sake of a few drops of their crystal life.

Sometimes the malady infused fails to harm the heart, even as the collapsing corpse unzips scale by scale, disintegrating into fine dust. Instead the plump, pulsating clot falls and buries itself. In the stead of precious blood, brute earth fills its throbbing core and flows through its atria, as a beggar pilgrimaging through a palace. And with each beat, the soil acquires the redder, crystal aspect of true blood. From the makeshift grave sand, grit and crushed rocks spread as a living desert, devouring our lush envy.

In the midst of one such roseate desert stands a Tower carven from Alabaster. It is said a dying God sculpted it for his bride, tracing its shape with his bare fingers, moulding the stone a caress at a time, scratching skylights and portholes into the translucent stone. As he laboured, tender each touch, he eroded his hands past existence, salving their demise with the sweat and tears he rubbed into the rock.

His stumpy fingers still so dexterous that they fashioned within the spire round rooms amidst an arabesque of corridors, each styled with mural upon mural of myths and legends sculptured in sleep by the mistress living within, each story crowned by 3 words writ in charcoal. At the very pinnacle, within an oval chamber he placed not only the dame's bed but, to her delight, also a replica precise of the very steeple it was housed in. The same chambers and galleries, frescoes and syllables, that very sanctum sheltering the spire, and the same love etched within it as without. A Matryoshka of ivory towers...

By day, 'twas a lighthouse concentrating the light pouring out of the shining hole in the sky, beckoning the nomadic winds whose motions stirred even the sedentary sands. When dark fell, the light trapped in its labyrinth web of stony threads, caged as in diamond, would search out its pores and perspire without.

Some say a Raven, an Icarus of its own kind, would fly too close to the tower on such nights, and clothe itself not merely in the onyx yarns, but taint its darkness in the light lingering within. Or perhaps not tarnish but sharpen the edges of his ebony, reminding him that e'en his eve carries the seed of morn. Ash-Winged Rokh, some call him, or Night's Mirror, or Charred Cherub, or Lone Silverback... Lone because he is the last and first. Lone because he feels not loneliness. Lone because he sees no frontier 'tween self, sand or sky. Lone because his beak spoke too sharply of love. Lone because his true name is Raven, and evermore will be.