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brain plasticity

This shows an older man walking, surrounded by music notes and gears.

·April 7, 2026·9 min read

Hearing Loss Overwhelms the Aging Brain

A new study finds that combined physical and cognitive training improves balance in older adults with Mild Cognitive Impairment, even those with hearing loss. The research highlights how sex and hearing perception influence recovery.

Featured Neurology Neuroscience

·March 26, 2026·10 min read

Stroke Survivors’ Brains Rejuvenate to Compensate for Injury

Can a stroke make part of your brain younger? New research using deep learning reveals that undamaged brain regions reorganize and show "youthful" structural patterns to compensate for severe stroke damage.

This shows a brain and a person working out.

Featured Neuroscience

·February 12, 2026·6 min read

Neural Afterburn: Brain Rewires Itself to Boost Endurance

Building endurance isn't just about muscles, it's about the brain. New research suggests that a specific "afterburn" of brain activity following a workout is the secret to getting stronger, effectively rewiring your neural circuits to power your heart and lungs.

This shows a brain with a night and day background.

Featured Neuroscience

·November 13, 2025·6 min read

Brain Learning Power Peaks at Specific Times of Day

A new study reveals that the brain’s responsiveness and capacity for learning shift with the time of day, governed by molecules like adenosine that link metabolism, sleep, and neural signaling. Using optogenetics, researchers found that identical stimuli activated brain cells differently at sunrise versus sunset, suggesting that neuronal excitability and plasticity follow daily rhythms.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·November 6, 2025·8 min read

Meditation Retreat Sparks Rapid Brain & Immune System Changes

A week-long retreat combining meditation and mind-body healing produced significant changes in brain activity and blood biology, demonstrating how consciousness-based practices can transform physical health. Participants showed reduced default-mode activity, enhanced neural connectivity, elevated natural opioids, immune activation, and metabolic shifts—effects that extended beyond the brain into the entire body.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·September 25, 2025·4 min read

Prozac May Rewire the Brain by Loosening Rigid Neural Circuits

A new study shows that fluoxetine, better known as Prozac, does more than increase serotonin—it changes how brain cells handle energy and rebuild connections. After two weeks of treatment, parvalbumin interneurons in the prefrontal cortex became less rigid, with mitochondrial energy genes reduced and plasticity genes upregulated.

This shows a neuron and plastic particles.

Featured Neuroscience

·September 15, 2025·4 min read

Nanoplastics Disrupt Brain Energy, Threatening Memory Function

Scientists have uncovered a mechanism by which nanoplastics impair brain energy metabolism, offering new clues into environmental contributions to neurodegeneration. The particles disrupted mitochondrial electron transfer and reduced energy production in both general and synaptic mitochondria.

This is a drawing of a shrew and a brain.

Featured Neuroscience

·September 1, 2025·7 min read

Shrews Shrink and Regrow Brains, Offering Clues for Human Diseases

Scientists used non-invasive MRI to study shrews that seasonally shrink and regrow their brains, uncovering water loss as the key driver of this rare phenomenon. Despite losing about nine percent of their brain volume in winter, shrew brain cells remain alive, with aquaporin-4 proteins playing a key role in regulating water movement.

Featured Neuroscience

·August 21, 2025·5 min read

Brain Retains Lost Limb’s Control Map, Defying Plasticity Theories

A groundbreaking study challenges decades of neuroscience by showing that the brain retains its map of a lost limb long after amputation. Using functional MRI scans taken before and after surgery, researchers found little change in cortical activity, even when participants attempted to move phantom fingers.

Featured Neuroscience

·June 4, 2025·4 min read

Brain Uses Separate Synapses to Balance Learning and Stability

New research has overturned a long-held belief in neuroscience by showing that the brain uses separate synaptic transmission sites for spontaneous and evoked signaling. Traditionally thought to share the same origin, these two forms of communication actually emerge from distinct sites, each following its own developmental path.

Featured Neuroscience

·May 29, 2025·8 min read

Astrocytes May Hold the Key to Brain’s Vast Memory Capacity

New research proposes that astrocytes—long thought to be merely supportive cells—may significantly enhance the brain’s ability to store memories. Unlike neurons, astrocytes cannot fire electrical signals but can influence synaptic activity through calcium signaling and gliotransmitters.