Thoughts before the o-chem final

I am taking an exam in 6 hours that will play a big role in whether or not i go to med school. Its a scary feeling because I am old enough now to realize the impact of this outcome, not just on my future, but on my family. For the first time I feel like I am not doing this just as a individual, but as someone who carries the hopes and dreams of his parents. No, Im not doing this because they want me too, hell they supported me when I wanted to be an artist at the age of 21 —21 is old enough to scare people with that decision. They have not only invested time and money into my education, when I know thats the last thing they can afford, they have also invested their dreams. So while i havent shaved in weeks and my room was trashed (until my awesome girlfriend arrived and folded my stagnating laundry while I freaked out over E2 reactions), I am doing this not just for myself, but for them. And whatever happens, I will follow this dream to the end. 

I am applying that computational neuroscience math to stocks. I was in the process of running a Fourier decomposition on Starbuck’s data for the past three years (in R) when I realized that my sampling frequency was lower than 1.157*10^-5 Hz (longer than 1 day). While this resolution gives me a good look at the low-pass trends, I am interested in day-trading. So, I decided to find higher resolution data to train and test my really simple feed-forward network on.

After an afternoon of searching through companies offering 10 years of historical stock data for anywhere between 5 euros a stock for 1 month of data to $85,000 for all stocks for 12 years, I finally found what I was looking for. $50 gets you a DVD with bihourly data for every useful US equity for the last year. When it arrives, I plan on cross-validating it with Google Finance to see how accurate it is.

http://www.equitymarketdata.com/historical

You can also get a free 14 day trial: https://www.equitymarketdata.com/login

This demonstrates the acuity of the ultrasonic stimulation (US). 

“The movie below illustrates the stimulation of intact motor cortex using transcranial pulsed ultrasound. In the movie, a “yellow” LED flashes to indicate the delivery of a pulsed ultrasound waveform to the motor cortex. Depending on the location of stimulation, different movements can be triggered using pulsed ultrasound. The method is entirely noninvasive in mice and causes no cell death, no damage to cerebrovasculature, no damage to cellular ultrastructure, and no behavioral impairments. “

http://www.tylerlab.com/projects/ultrasound/invivo

This is the future of cognitive neuroscience as we know it. Dr. William J Tyler at ASU has found a way to stimulate subcortical structures, beyond the reach of TMS, non-invasively. Now that we are finally able to stimulate such areas, we can study the brain with a whole new level of control.

I wonder if turning up the intensity of frequency of the wave shuts down the neurons, and gives us the ability to turn the neural populations under the wave on and off?

Dr. Tyler has created a company, Synsonix, that presumably will bring these stimulation devices to the market. If they go public, I’m investing.

“As of yet, there is no solid hypothesis to explain how the ultrasonic waves cause neurons to fire. The most convincing theory is that it produces enough mechanical stress on ion channels to open them. Normally these channels remain gated until the electrical potential across the neuron’s membrane changes enough to fling them suddenly open and initiate the cascade effect we call an action potential.

Whatever the mechanism, the side effects on the cell seem to be minimal. Basic tests for cellular death showed no increases after applying the ultrasound.”

http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/biomedical/devices/bursts-of-lowintensity-ultrasound-make-neurons-fire

I just had a CT done on my ridiculous sinuses. I asked for a copy of my data and opened it in OsiriX. Heres the result. Next week I might superimpose my brain from a research MRI. Enjoy!

This is soo where im ending up

For President Obama’s 100th day in office, MIT SENSEable City Lab created visualizations of mobile phone call activity that characterize the inaugural crowd and answer the questions: Who was in Washington, D.C. for President Obama’s inauguration day? When did they arrive, where did they go, and how long did they stay?

http://www.gaffta.org/2010/05/26/senseable-cities-exploring-urban-futures/

IBM is making an interesting point that data analysis techniques are the future.

Literally, zoom ALL THE WAY in and out

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/525347