Breakthrough - Summer Edition/June 2021

Summer Edition / June 2021

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The Ramaz Science Publication

Table of Contents Serenading While Studying

by Ron Alweiss ’22 Pg. 4 Brain Implants Translates Thoughts into Text

by Sydney Eisenstein ’22 Pg. 7 Creating Water from Air

by Ariella Goloborodsky ‘23 Pg. 9

Burying the Dead

by Sarah Silverman ‘24 Pg. 14 One for the Ages

by Samantha Sinensky ‘21 Pg. 18

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The Future of Thoughts to Text

by Eric Kalimi ’22 Pg. 12

Thank you to all the readers and supporters of BreakThrough. It has been my honor and privilege to be part of bringing you the scienti c publication of the Ramaz Upper School. I rst want to thank my co-editor, Sydney Eisenstein ’22, and faculty advisor, Ms. Lenore Brachot, and all the students who contributed such fantastic articles over the years. We were particularly challenged the last year and a half with limited access to social personal interactions. Compiling interesting scienti c articles for the Ramaz student body was, an engaging pursuit and a constructive way to utilize my time, and it allowed me, in my own small way, to uphold the scienti c process and method.

We have all come to realize that only through rigorous scienti c involvement can we meet the challenges of the future.

I hope our readers can appreciate all the work that has gone into producing such a ne journal over the years. I will cherish every moment that I worked with my colleagues and faculty to bring BreakThrough to you!

With Deep Gratitude, Samantha Sinensky ’21

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Graduating Editor’s Letter

Music is one of the best ways for most people to destress and motivate themselves.

Music is proven to decrease blood pressure, heart rate and regulate anxiety and stress hormones. People listen to music when they work out, relax, and even while studying, but does music help students retain information, or does it distract them?

The Mozart Effect is a theory developed in the 1990s that suggests listening to classical music can make a person smarter. One experiment in 1993 tested college kids: the researchers played one of Mozart's sonatas while the students performed various tasks. Results showed up to a 9-point increase in the students' IQ scores while listening to classical music, so the media began presenting music as a way to boost intelligence. Pregnant women even began putting headphones on their stomachs to make their children smarter while still in the womb. However, researchers debunked this theory ten years later.

They analyzed data from 40 individual experiments relating to the Mozart Effect. They all concluded that classical music doesn't provide instant IQ points and exerted minimal influence on their cognitive abilities.

Researchers conducted a similar experiment around the same time known as the Blur Effect.

They evaluated a group of students and made them listen to British pop music from the band Blur. The data showed that kids did better on tests while listening to this music: they did substantially better than the group that experienced the Mozart Effect. Further studies concluded that the reason classical or pop music improves studying is because music makes people happy. When people listen to music, a neurotransmitter in our brains called dopamine is released, which induces a joyous feeling. Studies indicate that when people are happier, they perform better. Students scored better while listening to pop than classical because more students enjoy listening to pop, so their dopamine levels are higher.

However, some cases prove particular genres of music to be less effective and even distracting.

Music that produces angry emotions results in a decrease in reading comprehension and other everyday tasks. Music that contains an overabundance of words is also discouraged because students focus more on comprehending the song than their task, making rap a strenuous genre to listen to while studying.

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Serenading While Studying

ing into their ears or struggling to perceive the sounds.

A recent study performed by Manuel Gonzalez of Baruch College and John Aiello of Rutgers University explains that music while studying isn't a "one-size-fits-all" approach. It depends on the music and the person listening to it. The researchers instructed the students to execute a trivial task while isolated in an atmosphere with no music, simple music, or complex music. The data showed that people should listen to music while studying based on their personality. People who get bewildered easily do worse while listening to music because of their present need for external stimulation. Others who don't require external stimulation perform better because of music.

Music remains an incredible way to boost creativity, motivation, and in some cases, grades. The optimal music to listen to is something the student enjoys but will serve merely as a background. If someone is distracted easily and has trouble multitasking, music might make studying more difficult.

However, if a student can devote the necessary attention to their work, music can place the student into the positive mindset needed to do their best.

Ron Alweiss!"22

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Excessively loud or faint music is also problematic because students are distracted by the music blast-

"2019: Is It OK To Listen To Music While Studying? - University Of Wollongong – UOW". Uow.Edu.Au, 2021, https://www.uow.edu.au/media/2019/is-it-ok-to-listen-to-music-while-studying.php#:~:text=In%20a%20nutshell "Does Listening To Music Help You Become A Better Student?". Study International, 2021, https://www.studyinternational.com/news/does-listening-to-music-while-studying-make-you-a-betterstudent/ "Does Music Help You Study: Science Says There Are Many Benefits". Florida National University, 2019, https://www.fnu.edu/benefits-studying-music May, Cindi. "Does Music Boost Your Cognitive Performance?". Scientific American, 2020, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-music-boost-your-cognitive-performance/

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References

Have you ever wanted people to know what you’re thinking without having to speak?

Researchers have combined neural implants with AI to further this goal. Electrodes in a paralyzed man’s brain made his imagined handwriting into words typed on a screen. The electrodes produce electrical impulses that control brain activity. This breakthrough will most likely help people with disabilities communicate using their thoughts.

Researchers tested this phenomenon on a 65-year-old man who is paralyzed from the neck down. They implanted two grids of electrodes on the surface of his brain. The electrodes monitored brain activity in the part of the brain that controls hand and finger movements. Then, the man imagined writing letters with his hand; using an algorithm, researchers figured out the neural patterns that corresponded to each imagined letter and transformed those patterns into text on a screen.

Using this method, the man produced 90 characters, or 15 words, per minute. His rate is about as fast as the average typing rate of people his age on smartphones. Krishna Shenoy, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at Stanford University, reported that the system worked long after the injury. She said, “The big surprise is that even years and years after spinal cord injury, where you haven’t been able to use your hands or fingers, we can still listen in on that electrical activity. It’s still very active.”

Although the thought-to-text system is groundbreaking, it is still in its early stages. Further research with more volunteers is needed, but Shernoy says that, “there’s little doubt that this will work again in other people.” The researchers plan to test the method with someone who has lost both the ability to move and speak.

Sydney Eisenstein ’22

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Brain Implant Translates Thoughts into Texts

Dave, Anushree. May 12, 2021. “Brain implants turn imagined handwriting into text on a screen”, ScienceNews.

Mack, Eric. May 13, 2021. “Brain implants let paralyzed man write on a screen using thoughts alone”, cnet.

Rajeswaran, Pavithra. Orsborn, Amy. May 12, 2021. “Neural interface translates thoughts into type”, Nature.

Stetka, Bret. May 12, 2021. “New Brain Implant Turns Visualized Letters into Text”, Scientific American.

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References

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Water. Humanity's greatest need, and our greatest struggle. Water is essential to life, yet currently, over 780 million people do not have access to clean drinking water. Naturally, as climate change continues, this number would be likely to increase. Luckily, that reality was changed with the invention of the WaterGen technology, created by Arye Kohavi, a former combat commander in the Israeli army. He created a GENius machine that produces fresh, pure drinking water out of thin air!

The Water Gen technology creates atmospheric water using a heat-exchange technology, and it’s biggest machine is able to produce over 5,000 liters of clean water a day! The WaterGen technology works by drawing air into it, using its built-in blower. Once the air enters the WaterGen, an internal filter cleans it, removing the dust and dirt. The next step is to turn the air into water. This is done by putting the air through a heat exchange and cooling process. Essentially, this process brings the air to its dew point - the temperature where air condenses and turns into water. The water is then once again put through chemical, physical, and biological treatments, in order to clean it. Then, it is mineralised in order to maintain its taste and health. And finally, the water is stored and continuously circulated to maintain its freshness. Due to this intense filtration process, the water made using the WaterGen technology is usually even higher quality than regular filtered water.

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Creating Water from Air

The WaterGen technology uses only one kW (kilowatt) of energy to produce one gallon of water. To put this into perspective, other water generators use four times as much energy to produce the same gallon of water. Through this conservation of energy, WaterGen is able to be used in areas with minimal energy supply, and reduce the prices of drinking water. For areas with no energy, WaterGen created another option: a battery operated machine. The company used a reverse osmosis process to filter and purify the water, and this new product can produce up to 1,200 liters per day. The WaterGen system is also very Eco-friendly; it reduces the dependence on plastic by eliminating the use of plastic water bottles.

Water Gen’s vision for the future is to upgrade its technology to supply a renewable source of freshwater to the entire world, for cheap and on demand. “Access to clean drinking water is an innate human right. No one in the 21st century deserves to live without access to clean drinking water, our mission at Water Gen is to provide clean and safe drinking water to all people around the globe,” said Dr. Michael Mirilashvili, the President of Water Gen.

Ariella Goloborodsky ’23

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Not only does WaterGen develop water from thin air, it does it through using minimal energy!

Keyser, Zachary. “Israeli Tech Company Producing Water from Air Gets Top Honor in Las Vegas.” The Jerusalem Post | JPost.com, 9 Jan. 2020, www.jpost.com/israel-news/israeli-tech-companyproducing-water-from-air-earns-honor-in-lasvegas-613623#:~:text=smart%20home%20innovations.-,Created%20by%20the%20environmentally% 20savvy%20Rishon%20Lezion%2Dbased%20tech%20company,and%20disposal%20by%20eliminating%20the.

Technology | Watergen. www.watergen.com/technology/.

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References

On May 12, 2021, researchers from Stanford University announced that they had successfully translated thoughts to text. The researchers implanted miniature grids of electrodes to the surface of a 65-year-old man's brain who is paralyzed from the neck down. When the man imagined writing letters with a hand that he hasn’t moved for years because of a spinal cord injury, he saw the words appear on a screen in front of him. With the help of artificial intelligence and general text autocorrect software, the system accurately recognized over 99% of the man’s characters.

Research in brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) focuses on helping people without motor abilities to communicate through the computer. Other approaches focus on simple tasks such as point and click typing. This approach uses the human brain’s complexity to produce results. Instead of simplifying the task for the test subject, the researchers told the man in this study to think about his handwriting, a complex dexterous action. This added complexity contributed to the increase in brain activity and thus the outstanding results. The man produced 90 characters a minute, a figure larger than the average cell phone typing speed for his age group.

Krishna Shenoy, a Stanford University researcher, says “the big surprise is that even years and years after spinal cord injury, where you haven’t been able to use your hands or fingers, we can still listen in on that electrical activity. It’s still very active.” The neurological complexity that allows humans to accomplish complex actions is deeply ingrained into human biology and according to the researchers, is key to furthering brain-computer interfaces.

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The Future of Thoughts to Text

References F.R. Willett et al. High-performance brain-to-text communication via handwriting. Nature. Published online May 12, 2021. doi: 10.1038/s41586-021-03506-2.

Dave, Anushree. “Brain Implants Turn Imagined Handwriting into Text on a Screen.” Science News, 12 May 2021, www.sciencenews.org/article/brain-implants-translate-handwriting-text.

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Eric Kalimi ’22

What is death? Now that question can have many different answers, based on if you are taking a scientific or religious approach. But one thing is sure, humans hold high regard for it and see it as a quintessential aspect of our existence. An archeological dig in Africa has shined light on humanity's history with the afterlife and the burial procedures that go with it.

An actual image of the bones.

In modern-day Kenya, the burial site of a child from over 80,000 years ago was found. This will have been the earliest known human burial in Africa. After further research and delicate inspection of the specimen's teeth, the bones seem to have belonged to a child of two to three years of age. This discovery is especially interesting for scientists because the bones, nicknamed “Mtoto”—Swahili for "child" seem to have been handled with care and placed religiously. It seems that this community had a religious belief system that regarded death as a passage to the next life, resembling modern-day beliefs.

The gravesite is located in Panga ya Saidi, a massive cave system sprawled along an escarpment by the Kenyan coast that has also yielded other discoveries, including many bones and artifacts.

These types of sights are not uncommon in the region, but the discovery of a body placed in such a purposeful fashion is. The child appears to have been buried with their knees tucked under their chin

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Burying the Dead

and a pillow resting under their head. The body was likely coated in a material that has since disintegrated, such as plant fibers or animal skins. It is believed that Hunter-Gatherer societies, during the Middle Stone Age, had religious systems. Many are lost to history, due to writing not being invented yet. Archaeologists have tried piecing together Stone Age religions by drawings and other artifacts left behind, but much has been left to speculation. Humans during the Middle Stone Age were nomads.

These nomadic Hunter and Gatherer groups moved around constantly and had to hunt and scavenge for their food. This left little time for recreation and the development of culture. However, and as is shown by this new archeological discovery, Stone Age man seems to have had a belief in burial rights. It should also be noted that these bones belong to a child, and very few child tombs have been found dating from the period. The remains were originally discovered in 2013 but the fragments were so fragile that they turned to dust when the scientists tried to remove them. It took scientists years and countless different strategies to carbon date and get an accurate idea of the specimen's bone structure. More research is still being done on the remains' environment and how "Mtoto" actually died. This could play an influential part in understanding why it was laid the way it was and may shine a light on a long-forgotten religion. Burial and death are things we, as modern-day Homo Sapiens, have to deal with. It is comforting to know that we aren't the first, and won't be the last humans to deal with these issues.

Where the child was found at the mouth of the Panga ya Saidi cave site near Kenya’s tropical coast.

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Sarah Silverman ’24

References “Archaeologists Uncover Oldest Human Burial in Africa.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 5 May 2021, www.theguardian.com/science/2021/may/05/archaeologists-uncover-oldest-human-burial-in-africa.

Gorman, James. “Child's Grave Is Earliest Known Burial Site in Africa.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 5 May 2021, www.nytimes.com/2021/05/05/science/earliest-human-burialafrica.html.

“Prehistory: Religion.” English Heritage, www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/story-of-england/prehistory/religion/.

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An artistic rendition of what the child is believed to have looked like when it was buried. Based on bone structure data.

Geographic, 5 May 2021, www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/childs-grave-is-the-oldest-human-burial-found-in-africa.

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Shreeve, Jamie. “Child's Grave Is the Oldest Human Burial Found in Africa.” Science, National

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The average lifespan of adults in the United States and western civilization has increased from 48 to 78 years in the last century. The recent best seller, by Yuval Harari, Homo Deus, suggests that there is no reason that human beings can live well into their mid to late 100’s. We have the ability to limit war, famine and poverty. We have been able to conquer epidemics and pandemics with cures and vaccines. We are making great strides in combating heart disease, cancer, HIV, diabetes and most chronic illnesses. We have the scientific know-how to replace body parts. Science and research have led the way in encouraging changes to increase life span.

A recent study from Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology suggests that these methods can only go so far. The authors, Timothy Pyrkov, Peter Fedichev, etal, suggest that there exists a biological “resilience” entity that is responsible for the body’s ability to fight stresses. With aging, the resilience factor may determine actual life span. One factor that drives fluctuations in biological age is referred to as the “dynamic organism state indicator.” This is an individual’s resilience to stress and is the major factor in understanding a person’s longevity. As one ages, the recovery period from life’s stresses, such as an illness, sleep deprivation or strenuous work, slows down; it takes longer for the body to return to the baseline level of resilience. Even if medicine intervenes with a cure, the loss of resilience will always be a barrier from recovering to a complete healthy state. If we can determine a way to alter or manipulate this characteristic, we may indeed achieve “Homo Deity”

Samantha Sinensky ‘21

References Putka, Sophie. “Scientists Identify the Key to Extending Our Human Lifespan Dramatically.”

Inverse, Inverse, 25 May 2021, www.inverse.com/mind-body/how-long-can-humans-live.

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One for the Ages

ture Publishing Group, 5 Sept. 2019, www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02638-w.

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Abbott, Alison. “First Hint That Body's 'Biological Age' Can Be Reversed.” Nature News, Na-

We are honored to be part of bringing science to the Ramaz student body. Scienti c approach and rigorous research based on clear facts have proven time and time again to rescue us from ourselves.

This past year and a half has allowed us to focus on the many challenges that we will face in the future. Pandemics, climate challenges, alternative fuels, waste management, air quality control, food production, space travel, and many other topics must be approached utilizing scienti c methods.

At BreakThrough, we are proud to have published interesting, amusing, and scienti cally rigorous and relevant articles. We thank the Ramaz faculty, and particularly Ms. Lenore Brachot, for their support and guidance. We would like to leave our readers with this important timely quote by Terri Swearubgen, a renowned environmentalist.

“We are living on this planet as if we had another one to go to.”

We may eventually require interplanetary travel, but even that will require more scienti c input. BreakThrough will hopefully still be there for you to lead the way.

We continue our pursuit for knowledge of all kinds.

Samantha Sinensky ’21 and Sydney Eisenstein ’22

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Editors’ Letter

Hoping you all recharge with solar energy.

Have a great summer!

EDITORS Samantha Sinensky ’21 Sydney Eisenstein ’22 FACULTY ADVISOR Ms. Lenore Brachot

Follow us on Instagram @ramazbreakthrough

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