After the layoffs, I became a tech godfather

Chapter 228 The Five Senses, Five Perceptions, and the Brain

While Wang Rui was live-streaming, a seminar was also taking place at the First Affiliated Hospital of Linzhou University.

Zhang Lin, as the project leader, gave a full report on the relevant aspects.

The attendees ranged from hospital leaders and supervisory authorities to experts and researchers from numerous hospitals across the country, making it an unprecedentedly large gathering.

After listening to Zhang Lin's report, everyone remained silent for a long time.

Everyone is digesting the proposed plan.

“We all know about the feeling of fullness and hunger,” after a long pause, an expert from a hospital on the eastern coast spoke up: “In fact, as our research into the related phenomena has deepened, it has been determined that they are controlled by the ventromedial hypothalamus, the lateral hypothalamus, and the arcuate nucleus.”

"Hunger and satiety are fundamentally physiological phenomena regulated by complex neural and hormonal signals, mainly involving multiple hormones and signaling pathways secreted by the hypothalamus and gastrointestinal tract."

"This includes ghrelin, hunger signals, peptide YY, and the stomach's hunger receptors stretching the stomach wall and transmitting signals of whether the stomach is empty or full to the brain via the vagus nerve. The complex relationship formed by these multiple factors produces our human feelings of satiety and hunger."

"Regarding this part, could you explain in detail how this case protocol was implemented?"

The doctor got straight to the heart of the matter, which is also a question that everyone is very concerned about.

The brain is a very mysterious organ, and even now, modern science still has a very limited understanding of it.

In the past two years, many institutions have been researching and publishing numerous papers on the control of hunger and satiety.

The prevailing view now is that a hormone called GLP-1 in the gut can reach the brain via the bloodstream through peripheral pathways.

In addition, satiety signals can be sent directly through the vagus nerve, and some neurons in the nucleus solitary tract (NTS) and intermediate reticular nucleus in the brainstem can generate and release GLP-1.

They were eager to know what methods Zhang Lin's project team had used to achieve this effect.

Is it by directly stimulating the relevant neurons in the brain? Or by artificially synthesizing related hormones? Or some other method?
"I don't know." Everyone stared at Zhang Lin, and his answer surprised everyone.

"Don't know?" Many people were confused. What does that mean? Even if you say it's a secret, what does "don't know" mean?
"Are you hungry now?" Seeing everyone's confused looks, Zhang Lin asked a question that left everyone puzzled. They had just finished eating at a buffet, so they shouldn't be hungry, right?
But everyone rubbed their stomachs and checked again: "Yeah, we just ate."

"Alright, please look at the big screen." Zhang Lin mysteriously opened something and said, "Looking at plums can quench thirst, but touching water will cause suffocation. Look at each of these nine pictures for five seconds. After 45 seconds, 63% of people will feel hungry, no matter how full you were before."

These pictures were undoubtedly Xiao Sha's work. As for the underlying principles, Zhang Lin was not clear about them at the moment, but he had confirmed the effects through countless experiments.

"Huh?" Everyone present was somewhat bewildered: "Is it really that amazing?"

"Why don't you try and see?" Zhang Lin said with a smile.

People don't believe in superstitions, especially something so bizarre. Everyone stared wide-eyed at the pictures on the screen as instructed.

There are mountains and rivers, birds and beasts, tall buildings, stars and the Big Dipper... The pictures switch one after another.

"Gurgle, gurgle..." Before they had even finished looking at the nine pictures, some people seemed to hear their stomachs rumbling, and some even started drooling.

"Okay, that's all!" Zhang Lin stretched out his hand and asked the hungry comrades to raise their hands so he could see how many there were.

Of the more than thirty people in the conference room, more than twenty raised their hands, including the expert doctor from a coastal hospital who had just raised the question.

Everyone looked at each other, bewildered.

Some of the unresponsive people whispered to their colleagues, "Are you really hungry? Can you even eat anything?"

“Of course, I feel like I could eat a whole cow right now!” My colleague retorted, “Don’t you feel that way at all?”

The person who had asked the question earlier thought about it carefully again: "No, I was really engrossed in watching it, but my stomach is still bulging, and I still feel very full!"

"My stomach is also bloated, but I'm definitely feeling hungry." The entire meeting room was filled with small, whispering voices as people shared their feelings and discussed the possibilities.

"Is this a deception?"

"Is it the hormone that forms GLP-1? Or something else?"

"Was the satiety center stimulated? Through the eyes?"

"So, what is the reason?" someone asked, and everyone looked at Zhang Lin.

"Why? There's really no good explanation for this." Zhang Lin smiled. "If I asked everyone what 1+1 equals, you would all tell me it equals 2."

"These kinds of questions have fixed answers. But, if you've just eaten but feel hungry again after looking at a few pictures, the reasons behind it aren't that simple."

"In clinical practice, we have tested and found that some GLP-1 hormones are indeed produced during this process. As for the reason, unfortunately, it is just a phenomenon."

This is a phenomenon, which clearly means that this is how things happened, but the cause and principle are unknown.

"Furthermore, as you may have noticed, this only works for some people, and is ineffective for a minority," Zhang Lin said.
"But what I want to say is that currently it is only the visual impact. If we add hearing, touch, smell, etc., and then we can have targeted solutions for each individual."

"Especially for patients undergoing gastric surgery, the sensory nerves in the abdomen are the easiest to achieve the relevant effects. Based on our past data and experience, we have developed a set of simulated sensory perceptions of stomach wall stretching."

"Through these perceptions, we can directly send various signals of satiety and hunger to the brain," Zhang Lin said with a smile. "This is more direct and accurate than looking at a few pictures or listening to a part of the sound."

At this moment, everyone present instantly understood what Zhang Lin was doing, and the meaning was quite clear:
Just by looking at a few pictures, we can achieve this effect. Our abdominal sensory nerves simulate the stretching of the stomach wall. How effective is that? There's no need to explain further, right?
As for the underlying principles, it's indeed difficult to explain.

Zhang Lin only remembered Hao Cheng telling him: "Everything in the brain can be formed using the five senses. As long as you find the right pattern and the right point, you can achieve the same effect as directly stimulating brain neurons."

The five senses are the five kinds of knowledge, and the five senses of humans are all the ways in which the brain evolves and obtains information from the outside world.

By making proper use of the five senses, it is entirely possible to transmit any signal to the brain.

……

On the other side, in the small town of Xiaosha.

The new employees of Xinbian Technology, along with some newly recruited personnel, including Han Dong, who came from Nanling Guangdian and caused a huge stir, formed a task force personally led by Hao Cheng.

Their specialization is "five senses and five knowledges brain-computer interface". "The five senses are the five knowledges, which are all the ways the brain evolves and obtains information from the outside world. By using the combination of the five senses, all signals can be transmitted to the brain."

Hao Cheng's summary here is much more concise than Zhang Lin's, after all, this is firsthand information that Hao Cheng learned from late-night classes.

As for the feeling of fullness, that's just one application among many.

All the members of the project team were hissing at that moment, racking their brains but still finding it difficult to understand the meaning of Hao Cheng's words.

"The reason I can't understand is because you are too outstanding."

"Too outstanding?"

"Yes! Too much ingrained knowledge fills your minds, and too many established theories imprison your thinking," Hao Cheng said.
"Now, clear your mind: I'll tell you about a system Y, which has five entry points (A, B, C, D, E) for receiving external information, and these five entry points are all the ways it receives information."

"Then tell me, is it possible to find a way to achieve complete communication and control between the outside world and system A by controlling the information at each of the ABCDE entrances?"

"Of course it is possible! The conditions are both sufficient and necessary!"

Everyone nodded, because the relationship between Y and ABCDE in the conditions is indeed determined, so there must be some way to achieve communication and control.

"So, Y represents the brain, and ABCDE represent the five senses—sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch—then why can't it be? It certainly can!"

A group of people scratched their heads, feeling as if they were about to grow brains. It sounded reasonable, but it didn't match their common sense and understanding.

"So, we're forcibly turning your brains around. Of the five senses, three are crucial: sight, hearing, and touch," Hao Cheng emphasized. "At this point, take sight as an example; don't treat it as just sight."

"Then you might ask, how do we see it? Think of it as sensor A! Think of hearing as sensor B, and touch as embodied sensor C."

"How to use these three sensors, A, B, and C, to tell the brain the information we want to convey is the direction of our future research. Okay, that's all for today. You can digest this information yourselves."

Looking at the group of people scratching their heads and looking confused, Hao Cheng was also helpless: once some fixed ideas are formed, it is extremely difficult to change them.

Even if they explain it clearly and can understand the relationship between Y and ABCDE in terms of structure, they still have a hard time understanding how I can convey the signal that I am full to my brain through sight and touch.

Even when faced with reality, it's the same.

Not to mention them, even Hao Cheng, immersed in the atmosphere of the late-night classes, took quite some time to slowly sort out these things and imprint them in his mind.

However, for the project team members now, whether they understand or not is not so important; they just need to do what is required.

Now, Hao Cheng has completely sorted out the main tasks, which can be summarized as solving an equation:
Y = f(abcde).

In other words, to control the brain's Y-axis, one must solve this multivariate three-dimensional function with five variables: sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch. Different parameters convey different information.

However, according to the theory of sufficient and necessary conditions, no matter what information you want to convey, it can always be satisfied through the five variables of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch.

Now that we have a direction, all that's left is to research and calculate.

The actual work is certainly not as simple as it sounds. For example, every piece of sensory information, such as vision, involves a lot of consideration regarding the combination and density of information that the human eye encounters.

Nine pictures that make you hungry. This experiment was actually a small assignment that Hao Cheng did during his late-night class.

The tactile simulation of stomach stretching is, of course, the simplest type.

……

Back at the hospital, the pre-operative seminar in the conference room had ended, but everyone still looked completely bewildered.

The surgery itself was uneventful, but regarding the same theory of a senseless and unaware brain, if the team members at Baiju Technology were somewhat clueless, then they were completely baffled.

"Let the facts speak for themselves. We'll wait and see the patients and the results!" This was the consensus among everyone.

……

The patient arrived early the next morning.

Three days later.

"Relax, this is just a routine conversation." In the hospital's consultation room, Zhang Lin personally received Wang Rui and his parents for their final pre-surgery consultation.

Normally, this task is done by his students, but today is different.

"It's alright, doctor. I understand the whole situation and have already made a decision." Wang Rui smiled sweetly, making one feel a pang of pity for her.

"You may know it, but I still have to emphasize it to you again." Zhang Lin adjusted his glasses and paused. "You may have consulted Xiao Sha and calculated the success rate of the surgery. The number is very high, isn't it?"

"But numbers only represent a possibility. Once the surgery is performed, if it is successful, it is 1; if it is unsuccessful, it is 0. Any probability is meaningless in the face of the result. You must understand this point."

"There is another very important thing, which is that your surgery is the first of its kind in the world. I hope you can understand what the first of its kind means."

"There are no precedents to follow, and no experience to draw upon." Wang Rui was firm in her stance. Zhang Lin wasn't trying to discourage her; he was simply stating the facts. With her body having largely recovered, maintaining the status quo was, in a way, the better option.

At this point, he had to put aside all external factors, such as being the first case, receiving honors, or achieving results. As a doctor, he had to give his most sincere advice.

Being a doctor truly is a profession that requires conscience, and Zhang Lin believes that his conscience is not yet completely gone.

"It is your obligation to inform you of the risks and offer advice, but I have already made the choice to do so."

Despite reading through a mountain of notices and confirmations, Wang Rui remained unfazed, smiling throughout. The still somewhat frail young girl was as stubborn as a mule.

Zhang Lin nodded emphatically: "Okay, the surgery is scheduled backstage at 7 pm. The nurse will give you all the instructions in a bit."

"Ok!"

(End of this chapter)