Brain’s Connectome From Branch to Branch
Max Planck scientists develop new analytical tools for the fast and accurate reconstruction of neural networks. The human brain is the most complex of all organs, containing billions of neurons with their corresponding projections, all woven together in a highly complex, three-dimensional web. To date, mapping this vast network posed a practically insurmountable challenge to [...]
Researchers Aim for Direct Brain Control of Prosthetic Arms
Engineers work to design prosthetic arm that allows amputees to feel what they touch. Engineering researchers at four U.S. universities are embarking on a four-year project to design a prosthetic arm that amputees can control directly with their brains and that will allow them to feel what they touch. While it may sound like science [...]
Researchers Graft Olfactory Receptors onto Nanotubes
Penn researchers have helped develop a nanotech device that combines carbon nanotubes with olfactory receptor proteins, the cell components in the nose that detect odors. Because olfactory receptors belong to a larger class of proteins that are involved in passing signals through the cell membrane, these devices could have applications beyond odor sensing, such as [...]
Scientists Use New Technology to Show That Interrupted Sleep Impairs Memory in Mice
With the novel use of a technique that uses light to control brain cells, Stanford University researchers have shown that fragmented sleep causes memory impairment in mice. Until recently scientists have been unable to tease out the effects on the brain of different yet intertwined features of sleep. But these investigators were able to overcome [...]
Memories May Skew Visual Perception
Taking a trip down memory lane while you are driving could land you in a roadside ditch, new research indicates. Vanderbilt University psychologists have found that our visual perception can be contaminated by memories of what we have recently seen, impairing our ability to properly understand and act on what we are currently seeing. “This [...]
Gardening in the Brain
Specialist cells prune connections between neurons Gardeners know that some trees require regular pruning: some of their branches have to be cut so that others can grow stronger. The same is true of the developing brain: cells called microglia prune the connections between neurons, shaping how the brain is wired, scientists at the European Molecular [...]
Researchers Create First Artificial Neural Network Out of DNA
Molecular soup exhibits brainlike behavior Artificial intelligence has been the inspiration for countless books and movies, as well as the aspiration of countless scientists and engineers. Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have now taken a major step toward creating artificial intelligence—not in a robot or a silicon chip, but in a test [...]
Cancer Cells and Stem Cells Share Same Origin – Brain Cells Grown from Skin
Scientists at the Keck School of Medicine of USC grow brain cells from skin Oncogenes are generally thought to be genes that, when mutated, change healthy cells into cancerous tumor cells. Scientists at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California (USC) have proven that those genes also can change normal cells [...]
Researchers Find Neural Signature of Mental Time Travel
Almost everyone has experienced one memory triggering another, but explanations for that phenomenon have proved elusive. Now, University of Pennsylvania researchers have provided the first neurobiological evidence that memories formed in the same context become linked, the foundation of the theory of episodic memory. The research was conducted by professor Michael Kahana of the Department [...]
The Neuroscience of Creepy Robots – The Uncanny Valley Phenomenon
Your Brain on Androids Ever get the heebie-jeebies at a wax museum? Feel uneasy with an anthropomorphic robot? What about playing a video game or watching an animated movie, where the human characters are pretty realistic but just not quite right and maybe a bit creepy? If yes, then you’ve probably been a visitor to [...]
