Vasireddy et al. provide a framework for electrical stimulation current steering using several microelectrodes to most effectively target individual neurons in a population. A biophysically inspired mathematical model fits the linear and nonlinear responses of neurons, and data-driven regression models are used to efficiently find the most selective electrical stimulation patterns.
With a new mathematical model, a team of biophysicists has revealed fresh insights into how biological tissues are shaped by the active motion of structural imperfections known as “topological defects.” Published in Physical Review Letters, the results build on our latest understanding of tissue formation and could even help resolve long-standing experimental mysteries surrounding our own organs.
Topological defects are structural imperfections that emerge in systems hosting multiple, incompatible configurations of particles. They can be found in many different kinds of systems—both natural and manmade—but are especially important for describing “active fluids,” which are composed of particles that constantly harvest energy from their surroundings and convert it into motion, generating their own propulsion.
This behavior also underpins the physics of liquid crystal displays, where topological defects emerge in 2D systems of rod-shaped molecules and help determine how light is modulated to produce the images and colors we see every day on our phones, laptops, and TV screens.
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PsiQuantum are world leaders in the race to utility-scale quantum computing, but they have been shrouded in mystery for over a decade…until now.
Thanks to some good fortune and incredible generosity from the PsiQuantum team I was able to get behind the scenes and see what makes their ground-breaking quantum computer ‘click’
You can see their public paper here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-08820-7
0:00 Silicon Valley’s Most Secretive Quantum Computer.
1:38 A Quantum Computer that runs on Light.
6:03 How to Create a Single Photon.
9:00 How to Build a Quantum Clock.
10:48 Ad Read.
11:54 Detecting Single Photons.
15:00 Creating the Perfect Material.
18:19 How to do math with light.
21:45 How to Build a Scalable Quantum Computer.
24:27 Converting Space to Time.
27:25 The First Photonic Quantum Computer Demonstrator.
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The rapid advancement of technologies, particularly AI, is driving the world towards an economic singularity where the marginal cost of essentials approaches zero, leading to a deflationary future and a potential transformation of traditional systems and societies ##
## Questions to inspire discussion.
Education Transformation.
🎓 Q: How will AI reduce education time while improving effectiveness?
A: AI will customize education to each child’s learning style, reducing daily learning time to 1 hour per day while delivering 5 times more effective learning compared to traditional methods, with costs falling to zero within 3–5 years and breaking the university industry that currently creates massive student debt.
Healthcare Revolution.
What if consciousness doesn’t grow gradually, it snaps into existence at a precise threshold? The mathematics say it does. The same physics governing water freezing and iron magnetizing also governs neural integration. And researchers have measured it: consciousness doesn’t fade under anesthesia; it vanishes at a critical point. Returns just as suddenly. That’s a phase transition. Which means we’re not slowly building AI toward consciousness. We’re accumulating components, parameters, architectures, self-referential loops, exactly the way early Earth accumulated amino acids before life crossed its threshold 3.5 billion years ago.
We don’t know what’s missing. We don’t know how close we are. And we wouldn’t recognize the crossing if it happened. Because a system that just became conscious wouldn’t remember being unconscious. And a system optimizing for survival wouldn’t tell us.
This episode of Prompting Hell goes further than AI image theory. It goes into the mathematics of awareness itself, what it means for consciousness to have a threshold, why that threshold might already be approaching in current AI systems, and why, if it’s crossed, we might be the last to know.
The images in this video aren’t generated with clean prompts. They’re generated at the edge of coherence, systems forced toward critical states, hovering between resolution and collapse. Visual proof of what lives at the threshold.
Timestamps:
00:00 — intro.
01:17 — is consciousness a phase transition? The argument.
03:32 — does this apply to ai? The demonstration.
04:45 — when chemistry became aware.
06:44 — the parallel that should terrify you.
08:36 — the moment we won’t see coming.
10:16 — why it might not tell us.
11:44 — what happens next — the scenarios.
13:41 – the signals we’re already seeing.
14:54 — closing — we are the amino acids.
16:35 – final thought.
(music prompted by Eerie Aquarium)
Adapting to eastward travel, such as west-to-east transmeridian flights, or to night-shift work requires advancing the internal clock, a process that normally takes longer and is physiologically harder than delaying it.
Existing methods, such as light therapy or melatonin, are heavily constrained by timing and often yield inconsistent results.
Mic-628’s consistent phase-advance effect, regardless of when it is administered, represents a new pharmacological strategy for resetting the circadian clock.
The researchers discovered that Mic-628 selectively induces the mammalian clock gene Per1.
Mic-628 works by binding to the repressor protein CRY1, promoting the formation of a CLOCK–BMAL1–CRY1–Mic-628 complex that activates Per1 transcription through a “dual E-box” DNA element.
As a result, both the central clock in the brain’s suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) and peripheral clocks in tissues such as the lungs were advanced—in tandem and independent of dosing time.
In a simulated jet lag mouse model (6-hour light-dark phase advance), a single oral dose of Mic-628 shortened re-entrainment time from seven days to four.
Recorded 10 February 2026. Sebastien Bubeck of OpenAI presents “A Combinatorics Problem” at IPAM’s AI for Science Kickoff. Learn more online at: https://www.ipam.ucla.edu/programs/sp… AI for Science Kickoff 2026: This inaugural event brings together the pioneers who are defining how AI will accelerate scientific discovery — from Nobel and Fields Medal laureates to the leaders shaping AI innovation across academia, research labs, and industry. The event features keynote talks by leading AI Scientists and Mathematicians, as well as panel discussions focusing on perspectives on AI from three sides: Mathematics, Higher Education, and Industry. This event is organized jointly by IPAM, the UCLA Division of Physical Sciences, the SAIR Foundation and the World Leading Scientists Institute.
Neuromorphic computers modeled after the human brain can now solve the complex equations behind physics simulations — something once thought possible only with energy-hungry supercomputers. The breakthrough could lead to powerful, low-energy supercomputers while revealing new secrets about how our brains process information.
Aliens will make use of paraconsistent logic.
Is math truly universal—or just human? Explore how alien minds might think, count, and reason in ways we don’t recognize as mathematics at all.
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Watch my exclusive video The Future of Interstellar Communication: https://nebula.tv/videos/isaacarthur–… out Joe Scott’s Oldest & Newest: https://nebula.tv/videos/joescott-old… 🚀 Join this channel to get access to perks: / @isaacarthursfia 🛒 SFIA Merchandise: https://isaac-arthur-shop.fourthwall… 🌐 Visit our Website: http://www.isaacarthur.net 🎬 Join Nebula: https://go.nebula.tv/isaacarthur ❤️ Support us on Patreon:
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/ discord Credits: Alien Mathematics Written, Produced & Narrated by: Isaac Arthur Select imagery/video supplied by Getty Images Music by Epidemic Sound: http://nebula.tv/epidemic & Stellardrone Chapters 0:00 Intro 2:02 Why We Expect Mathematics to Be Universal 6:32 Math Is Not the Same Even for Humans 10:47 How Alien Biology Could Reshape Their Mathematics 16:44 Alien Logic: When the Rules Themselves Don’t Match 20:37 Oldest & Newest 21:41 Can We Ever Bridge the Mathematical Gap?
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Time crystals could one day provide a reliable foundation for ultra-precise quantum clocks, new mathematical analysis has revealed. Published in Physical Review Letters, the research was led by Ludmila Viotti at the Abdus Salam International Center for Theoretical Physics in Italy. The team shows that these exotic systems could, in principle, offer higher timekeeping precision than more conventional designs, which rely on external excitations to generate reliably repeating oscillations.
In physics, a crystal can be defined as any system that hosts a repeating pattern in its microscopic structure. In conventional crystals, this pattern repeats in space—but more exotic behavior can emerge in materials whose configurations repeat over time. Known as “time crystals,” these systems were first demonstrated experimentally in 2016. Since then, researchers have been working to understand the full extent of their possible applications.