Brainoid

The micro-callosal interface and PROTOCOL sent from the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris finally arrived in Qi Min’s hands.

I have seen it from the article of that research group before. This "corpus callosum interface" is not so much an interface as an inserted electrode array group. And its name contains "corpus callosum", which seems to give the impression that these electrodes are directly connected to the nerve fibers of the corpus callosum. However, in actual operation, since the shape of the corpus callosum is obviously different in different individuals (even for humans, there are differences between men and women), the electrode array only needs to be connected to neurons that are close to the corpus callosum.

According to traditional neurobiology, a brain-computer interface must not only be able to transmit incoming and outgoing signals, but also have the function of demodulating signals. This is because usually when people study brain-computer interfaces, the essential need is to understand the brain. But Qi Min only needs to study whether brainoids can exhibit similar characteristics to animal brains, so there is no need to demodulate the collected electrical signals. This micro-callosal interface, which is actually just a set of precision electrode arrays, just meets her needs.

However, it may take some time to study how to use this thing.

Because when he was studying for his Ph.D., he used living tissue to measure neurons, Qi Min was quite familiar with animal experiments. After getting the corpus callosum interface, she began to conduct experiments with Ke Querk. On the one hand, this was to keep up with the progress of the experiment, and on the other hand, it was also because the corpus callosum interface was sent by the PI of the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris. If Ke Yue was allowed to operate it alone, he would not be able to bear the responsibility if anything happened.

Fortunately, although Ke Li is not very good at writing code, he really has a way to deal with rats. Animal experiments are not as easy to transform into communicable knowledge as experience in molecular biochemistry. The techniques for operating on live animals cannot be learned by reading the literature or listening to other people's lectures.

After watching his operation, Qi Min had to admit that perhaps the bugs that always occurred in her experiments during her Ph.D. study were related to her disabled hand. It seems that she might be better off doing more dry experiments or biochemical cell experiments that do not require such delicate operations.

Qi Min and Ke Li worked in the clean room for a day, and finally installed the corpus callosum interface on a rat - during this process, they also created several innocent rats that became biochemical waste due to failed experiments.

After leaving the clean room, Qi Min looked at his watch and saw that it was already half past seven, only to realize that not only had they missed lunch, but they were also about to miss dinner.

"Forget it... let's install the interfaces for the remaining three tomorrow." Qi Min took off his hood and said to Ke Yue, "We can't handle the three tonight anyway. We have to go to eat first, otherwise we won't be able to eat in the cafeteria. Gone."

"Is the cafeteria food gone at this time?" Ke Li asked.

"The regular canteen is probably gone, but the hot pot one is probably still open." Qi Min said, "Let's go, hurry up. Don't worry, today's meat rolls will be sold out, and even the hot pot will have to be vegan."

——

Qi Min and Ke Li rode their bikes and hurried to the only hot pot restaurant in the school. Fortunately, most people who go to eat hot pot are not in a hurry, so hot pot restaurants usually stay open until almost nine o'clock, which is still their normal business hours.

After a day of experimenting, both of them were already very hungry. They casually ordered some set meals and asked the waiter to serve them quickly. While eating, the two of them rarely spoke much. Whenever the food was cooked, they took it out and ate it.

They continued to eat in silence like this until there was only some food left and then noodles. Ke Li drank the last sip of Coke and said with some emotion: "It's been a long time since I did an experiment for such a long time."

"Don't tell me, I have never done experiments for such a long time." Qi Min said with a smile. When she was studying for a Ph.D. in the United States, the members of the laboratory were usually not in a hurry, and they rarely missed lunch in order to conduct an experiment.

"Oh, you are really asking for trouble by tinkering with animals." Ke Li couldn't help complaining, "If you are making bacteria and yeast, if you can't make it in half a day, you can put it down and raise it for a day before making it. Even the rats failed several times. Don’t let it go even if you succeed, otherwise it will die for you in a minute.”

"Yes, you can't even save time to eat in between." Qi Min also said, "But to put it this way, being a scientific researcher is not the worst, being a doctor is really life-threatening. It is really complicated. Some surgeries can take more than ten hours, and you definitely can’t stop in the middle of it.”

"Well, that's true." Ke Yue smiled, "Experimental animals cannot be compared with humans. And in the final analysis, even if a rat is connected to a brain-computer interface, it would be a waste if it fails and the rat dies. Just some money."

This is true, but Qi Min's place really doesn't have enough funds, so he can't afford to build it like this. And although she applied for a key bioinformatics project and has now been approved, it will take some time for the funds from the National Foundation Committee to be actually allocated. Even if the funds are obtained, they cannot be spent casually. The budgets for each reimbursement project are clearly written. Logically speaking, her bioinformatics project does not make sense to spend so much money on animal experiments. Therefore, she had to spend her money leisurely, lest the cost of this project would be too large and inconsistent with the budget, making it more difficult for her to apply for funding for other projects in the future.

"I think it's better for us to save some money." Qi Min said as tactfully as possible, "If the animal experiment exceeds the budget, it will be difficult to continue to demolish one wall to pay for the other."

"Why, we can't make thirty rats, how can this exceed the budget?" Ke Li asked incomprehensibly.

"For my bioinformatics project, I didn't originally want to allocate much workload to animal experiments." Qi Min explained with some embarrassment.

"But doing rat behavior is not cheap." Ke Yue said helplessly, "You don't understand the market, right? If you cooperate with the computing center, you don't have to spend much money to do dry experiments. But once it involves the corresponding in vivo experiments, , then the monthly turnover of more than 100,000 yuan is really easy.”

Qi Min really doesn't understand this market. When she was studying for a Ph.D., because her supervisor was relatively senior, the laboratory had its own full-time administrator. Usually, whether it is buying consumables or repairing instruments, it is all arranged by the administrator, so I really don’t have an accurate understanding of how much money I can spend on my projects every month.

And if it is in the United States, I am afraid that the money spent will be more than at home. Qi Min thought to himself, no wonder most PIs in the United States like to do research with promising applications and do whatever there is a market for. In fact, this may not be entirely for the purpose of making money, but perhaps just because the cost of doing experiments is too high, so you have to apply for funding in research directions that others are willing to invest in.

I have to say that China currently invests a lot of money in basic scientific research. Although people in the industry say every day that they will starve to death if they don’t have money, in fact some of the basic research done now may not be able to apply for much funding if it is carried out in Europe and the United States. , they can only be forced to do research that can transform results quickly and make money easily... So there are pros and cons. It has been a long time ago that you can't make money by doing basic scientific research. It depends on whether ideals and ambitions are more important or making money. It's important.