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Jeremy Barton | A Path to Atomically Precise Manufacturing @ Paths to Progress

Jeremy Barton and Nanotechnology.

*This video was recorded at ‘Paths to Progress’ at LabWeek hosted by Protocol Labs & Foresight Institute.*

Protocol Labs and Foresight Institute are excited to invite you to apply to a 5-day mini workshop series to celebrate LabWeek, PL’s decentralized conference to further public goods. The theme of the series, Paths to Progress, is aimed at (re)-igniting long overdue progress in longevity bio, molecular nanotechnology, neurotechnology, crypto & AI, and space through emerging decentralized, open, and technology-enabled funding mechanisms.

*This mini-workshop is focused on Paths to Progress in Molecular Nanotechnology*
Molecular manufacturing, in its most ambitious incarnation, would use programmable tools to bring together molecules to make precisely bonded components in order to build larger structures from the ground up. This would enable general-purpose manufacturing of new materials and machines, at a fraction of current waste and price. We are currently nowhere near this ambitious goal. However, recent progress in sub-fields such as DNA nanotechnology, protein-engineering, STM, and AFM provide possible building blocks for the construction of a v1 of molecular manufacturing; the molecular 3D printer. Let’s explore the state of the art and what type of innovation mechanisms could bridge the valley of death: how might we update the original Nanotech roadmap; is a tech tree enough? how might we fund the highly interdisciplinary progress needed to succeed: FRO vs. DAO?

*About The Foresight Institute*

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Insights into Persistent SARS-CoV-2 Reservoirs in Chronic Long COVID

Long COVID (LC), also known as post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 infection (PASC), is a heterogeneous and debilitating chronic disease that currently affects 10 to 20 million people in the U.S. and over 420 million people globally. With no approved treatments, the long-term global health and economic impact of chronic LC remains high and growing. LC affects children, adolescents, and healthy adults and is characterized by over 200 diverse symptoms that persist for months to years after the acute COVID-19 infection is resolved. These symptoms target twelve major organ systems, causing dyspnea, vascular damage, cognitive impairments (“brain fog”), physical and mental fatigue, anxiety, and depression. This heterogeneity of LC symptoms, along with the lack of specific biomarkers and diagnostic tests, presents a significant challenge to the development of LC treatments.

Yale Scientists Solve a Century-Old Brain Wave Mystery

Yale scientists traced gamma brain waves to thalamus-cortex interactions. The discovery could reveal how brain rhythms shape perception and disease. For more than a century, scientists have observed rhythmic waves of synchronized neuronal activity in the brain. Now, for the first time, researcher

One Mind, Two Bodies: Man With Brain Implant Controls Another Person’s Hand—and Feels What She Feels

It sounds like science fiction, but the system could boost collaborative rehabilitation, where groups of people with brain or spinal cord injuries work together. By showing rather than telling Denapoli how to move her hand, she’s nearly doubled her hand strength since starting the trial.

“Crucially, this approach not only restores aspects of sensorimotor function,” wrote the team. It “also fosters interpersonal connection, allowing individuals with paralysis to re-experience agency, touch, and collaborative action through another person.”

We move without a second thought: pouring a hot cup of coffee while half awake, grabbing a basketball versus a tennis ball, or balancing a cup of ice cream instead of a delicate snow cone.

How the brain’s activity, energy use and blood flow change as people fall asleep

A new study by investigators from Mass General Brigham has used next-generation imaging technology to discover that when the brain is falling asleep, it shows a coordinated shift in activity.

The researchers found that during NREM (non-rapid eye movement) , parts of the brain that handle movement and stay active and keep using energy, while areas involved in thinking, memory and daydreaming quiet down and use less energy. Their results are published in Nature Communications.

“This research helps explain how the brain stays responsive to the outside world even as awareness fades during sleep,” said corresponding author Jingyuan Chen, Ph.D., an assistant investigator at the Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging at Massachusetts General Hospital.

The Neuroscience Behind Writing: Handwriting vs. Typing—Who Wins the Battle?

Writing is a complex phenomenon that requires diverse skills: perceiving the pen and paper, moving the writing instrument, and directing the movement through thought. Using a pen involves paying attention to motor aspects such as drawing letters legibly, controlling the pressure of the tip on the paper, following lines and spaces on the page, and coordinating thought, action, and vision. This multisensory integration underlies memory abilities. Moreover, handwriting involves a wide variety of supporting materials, including pens, pencils, or chalk on a blackboard, all of which offer different experiences and create new neural activations and skills.

Despite sharing similar central goals and processes, handwriting and typing differ significantly in terms of the tools used, spatiotemporal dimensions, motor programming, and fine motor development. Compared with handwriting, which requires more time and attention to learn, typing can be considered simpler and faster, as it enables the production of a more easily readable and homogeneous product in less time. However, focused attention and a longer processing time improve memory retention, and once automatic control of the graphic gesture is achieved, minimal cognitive effort is required. Moreover, the specific movements memorized when learning to write contribute to the visual recognition of graphic shapes and letters and secondarily also improve reading ability. Indeed, since the ability to recognize letters is widely recognized in the literature as the first phase of reading, improving it through writing may effectively influence how children read.

The comparison between handwriting and typing reveals important differences in their neural and cognitive impacts. Handwriting activates a broader network of brain regions involved in motor, sensory, and cognitive processing, contributing to deeper learning, enhanced memory retention, and more effective engagement with written material. Typing, while more efficient and automated, engages fewer neural circuits, resulting in more passive cognitive engagement. These findings suggest that despite the advantages of typing in terms of speed and convenience, handwriting remains an important tool for learning and memory retention, particularly in educational contexts.

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