New Turn

I'm through with my degree but I dearly miss the cognitive high that it entailed. Tears prickled my eyes as I bade goodbye to Manchester last week. Life in the bustling city was a truly remarkable experience and I only hope I came out wiser than I went in..

What proved toughest to deal with was the well of loneliness that engulfed me through the weekdays. My yearning for Jaa's companionship was unparalleled; a desire unabated in spite of my friends. As the people dearest to me knew, the going got really tough the last few weeks before it was over and thanks to M, Hamza and Seem for having borne the brunt of my bickerings. But hey, I jumped the hurdle and am still standing upright - yayy!

Now for some flashbacks..

Halls: 15 minute walk from Uni..
Shortcut to Uni through Whitworth Park
Bus ride..View out my window
My room..

One of my notice boards..

Hefty brekkie

I have no idea what lies in store for me.. but for now, I'm happy.

RoCo

It was commonly said that body language, through gestures, postures and facial expressions, contributed to 55% of communication. Though the percentage cannot be generalized to all situations, body language is a crucial element of communication and empathy; a fact affective computing heavily invests on. The world's first expressive computer RoCo (RObotic COmputer), introduced to the world earlier this month, depends on detection and mirroring of posture to strike up a rapport with the user (known as postural congruence). Follow the New Scientist article to checkout a video of RoCo in action.

RoCo: adorable, innit?

Enjoy!

Is belief hardwired?

It's a fact that supernatural beliefs are widespread across different cultures. They often trail long histories of followers who have relished the feelings of transcendence, thrived on ritual practices and bled to protect their faiths. Although it's a call for belief without substantial evidence, people seem almost inclined to believe in superstitions. But why?

Several sources of empirical evidence regarding religious experiences are available at present. Imaging techniques have revealed alterations in brain activity during religious practices - particularly in the temporal and parietal lobes. Both temporal lobe epilepsy and the use of certain drugs, such as LSD, mescaline and ayahuasca, have reportedly produced hallucinations of a religious nature. More remarkable perhaps is the ability to induce religious states through electromagnetic activation of the brain areas involved in religious experiences.

These studies offer clues to the mechanism underlying religious states and open avenues for furthur research; but by no means do they provide sufficient evidence to answer the most critical of questions yet. Is god and spirituality concepts that we create because we are predisposed to believe in the supernatural?

Links to Horizon documentary God on Brain in five parts, 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5.

Enjoy!

M.E.N. events during EGM

Just a quick note to let you know the gigs playing at Manchester M.E.N. arena during and around the MSA EGM period. It'd be a great opportunity for you people to gang up and go for a show but you've got to book as early as possible for guaranteed tickets. Events:-
-Snoop Dogg and P. Diddy on 29th March
-Versus Cancer on 30th March starring the Charlatans, Ian Brown, Echo & the Bunnymen, Andy Rourke (Ex-Smith's) and Peter Hook (New Order's)
-Sugababes on 31st March
-Incubus on 1st April
-Razor Light on 3rd April.
Click here for the whole event listings or to book tickets.

A very warm welcome to Manchester. We are all looking forward to receiving you guests with open arms!

Snake date

At the Butterfly and Insect World, Edinburgh, Scotland, it was the Burmese Python (top left & bottom) that had me mesmerized the moment I walked into the reptile room. I stood gaping at the sheer size and beauty of it - the 14ft long giant was adorned with the most gorgeous of skins. Utterly terrified, I jumped everytime it moved! But as it slithered down the rocks to the glass partition, my fears vanished. Spell-bound, I squatted down and put my face right next to it in a beautiful shared moment. Shortly afterwards, out came Monty the Royal Python (top centre) with which we got to hold and play with...them mascular twitches..aarrgh! At the top right's a pair of anacondas chilling out in the pool.

Some more interesting pics: poisonous arrow frogs, glowing scorpions, pupa transforming into a butterfly, tarantula, Mexican redknee tarantula, etc..Enjoy!

Bonobo

One wrong letter

Tay-Sachs disease - an inherited rare condition that results from a recessive allele; a mutation on chromosome 15 of HEXA gene that proves fatal.

Watching the program Cracking The Code of Life, I was particularly touched by the clip One Wrong Letter. The mutation, in the case of Hayden, was caused by a single letter alteration in his DNA. The structure of a protein molecule was disrupted, affecting the breakdown of gangliosites in his nerve cells. Fatty acids accumulated in his brain as a result, swelling and crushing his brain cells, eventually causing blindness, seizures and death. More..

I can't bear to watch the kid suffer. Imagine how tormented the parents must feel; being responsible for their child's suffering yet not being able to do anything about it. But, from a different point of view, I find it quite fascinating that the consequences of a single letter, in a chain constituting more than 3 billion letters, could account for such grave and devastating effects. The documentary's a must-see!

Click for the clip, One Wrong Letter.

Shaking off the shackles

Exams over. Assignments handed in. And phew! the immediate pressure's gone. But gee, that was two weeks of sleep-deprived stress topped with too much taurine, too much cheddar minis and way too much caffeine. In an ideal world I'd be thinking three words right now: workout-meal-shower, but crap you caught me with only one: hibernation.

Before that, a coupla pics from me bro

Survivor

Wax marmosets

Trippy

Luv u, Iko

Enjoy!