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Category: Neuroscience

The brain’s language network is more extensive than previously thought

The brain’s language network is more extensive than previously thought

MIT News reports: For decades, neuroscientists have known that specific regions in the brain’s left hemisphere are responsible for processing language. However, a new study by MIT researchers shows that language processing also occurs in many other parts of the brain. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data from more than 700 people, the researchers identified 17 additional regions of the brain that appear to play a role in language. These regions are scattered across the brain, including parts of…

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Reading is the ultimate cognitive enhancer

Reading is the ultimate cognitive enhancer

Neuroscience News reports: In his new book, Falk Huettig, Senior Investigator at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, brings together research spanning psychology, linguistics, neuroscience, and education to answer that question. The result is a systematic account of how literacy reshapes memory, attention, language processing, and reasoning – and even abilities readers might not expect, like face recognition. Cognitive enhancement is having a moment, with people turning to better sleep, exercise, nutrition, stress management, and tools like caffeine or neurostimulation…

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The ‘little brain’ may give the aging mind a big boost

The ‘little brain’ may give the aging mind a big boost

Science News reports: The cerebellum, the wizened “little brain” nestled in the base of the skull, may help keep us sharp as we age. Regions at the back of the cerebellum that resisted shrinkage with age were tied to better mental functioning, or cognition, even in people in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease, researchers report June 10 in Nature Neuroscience. Though traditionally thought of as a movement control center, scientists now know the cerebellum is a key player in…

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How your brain creates ‘aha’ moments and why they stick

How your brain creates ‘aha’ moments and why they stick

Nora Bradford writes: Here are three words: pine, crab, sauce. There’s a fourth word that combines with each of the others to create another common word. What is it? When the answer finally comes to you, it’ll likely feel instantaneous. You might even say “Aha!” This kind of sudden realization is known as insight, and a research team recently uncovered how the brain produces it, which suggests why insightful ideas tend to stick in our memory. Maxi Becker, a cognitive…

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Speedy, spiraling electrical waves may be key to brain’s information flow

Speedy, spiraling electrical waves may be key to brain’s information flow

Science reports: Like a stadium full of sports fans doing the wave, neurons coordinate their electrical signals in rhythmic patterns that sweep across the cortex, the brain’s outermost layer. Recent studies in humans and animals have shown these patterns, called traveling waves, can take on complex shapes, among them a rotating spiral that has been observed during deep sleep, memory retrieval, and other brain processes. A new study has now captured the fast-spinning waves spanning whole brains, offering clues to…

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Are memories transferable — or edible?

Are memories transferable — or edible?

Claire L. Evans writes: It was the dead of winter in Boston. The surface of the Charles River was frozen solid. But Zachary Kelso braved the biting cold to finally put to rest a mystery that has haunted neuroscience labs for over half a century. To do that, Kelso, a research assistant in the Harvard lab of the neuroscientist Sam Gershman, needed some worms. Specifically, planarians: arrow-headed flatworms, which are among the simplest creatures to possess a brain and a…

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Neuroscience needs to stop treating the brain as if it is a computer

Neuroscience needs to stop treating the brain as if it is a computer

Àlex Gómez-Marín writes: What is a brain? The question might seem obvious, but it is not trivial. Neuroscience has progressed in the past century, with the development of sophisticated techniques to measure and manipulate brain cells, neural circuits and even animal behaviours. Yet how the brain actually works still eludes us. In The Brain, In Theory, neuroscientist Romain Brette deconstructs the predominant model of the brain, which treats the organ like a computer. He concedes that engineering metaphors can be…

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The brain processes language even under anesthesia, a new study finds

The brain processes language even under anesthesia, a new study finds

Time reports: Nestled in the core of the brain is the hippocampus, a little curve of tissue central to memory and learning. It serves as a processing center for our experiences, helping organize information as it comes in. The hippocampus does that when we’re awake—and, a new study suggests, even when we’re unconscious. The small study, published recently in the journal Nature, drew on data from seven people who had surgery to remove portions of their brains as a treatment…

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Neuroscientists are studying octopuses for insights into how intelligence evolved

Neuroscientists are studying octopuses for insights into how intelligence evolved

Nature reports: Three hearts; blue blood; no skeleton; arms like tongues. These are just some of the alien features of octopuses, squid and cuttlefish — members of the cephalopod family. The outlandish list continues. Cephalopod skin can taste chemicals, sense light and change colour and texture rapidly. In many species, the sucker-covered arms can even regenerate. These invertebrates have evolved independently from the vertebrate lineage for more than 600 million years. Their last common ancestor was probably a worm-like creature…

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Shared music listening synchronizes brain activity

Shared music listening synchronizes brain activity

PsyPost reports: While sharing a musical experience with a friend might not drastically alter your overall enjoyment of a song, it tends to synchronize your brain activity and emotional responses. A recent study published in the journal Cortex has found that listening to music with another person increases the moment-to-moment similarity of subjective pleasure and enhances neural alignment. These findings help explain how music acts as a powerful tool for social bonding and collective emotional experiences. Human beings naturally use…

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A new type of neuroplasticity rewires the brain after a single experience

A new type of neuroplasticity rewires the brain after a single experience

Yasemin Saplakoglu writes: Every experience we have changes our brain, the way a ceramicist reshapes a slab of clay. Every corner we turn, every conversation we have, every shudder we feel causes cascading effects: Chemicals are released, electricity surges, the connections between brain cells tighten, and our mental models update. The brain is “incredibly plastic, and it stays that way throughout the lifespan of a human,” said Christine Grienberger, a neuroscientist at Brandeis University. This plasticity, the quality of being…

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How understanding bioenergetics can help our brain health

How understanding bioenergetics can help our brain health

Hannah Critchlow writes: About 2 billion years ago, evolution performed an improbable experiment. A larger ancestral cell engulfed a smaller bacterium. It should have been a meal. Instead, it became a merger. The bacterium survived inside its host, and together they forged one of the most consequential partnerships in the history of life. The host offered shelter and access to oxygen. The bacterium supplied something revolutionary: a vastly more efficient way to generate energy. From this intimate alliance emerged the…

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Does exposure to nature really help reduce negative emotions?

Does exposure to nature really help reduce negative emotions?

Neuroscience News reports: You probably heard it from your mom a thousand times – fresh air and sunshine; it’s the cure for most anything. Now scientists at the University of Houston concur, measuring the impact of mother’s advice on mother nature to find that exposure to nature is associated with reductions in negative emotions. Given that nearly 90% of the U.S. population is projected to reside in urban areas by 2050, researchers say integrating nature into urban design and public…

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Dopamine: How neuroscience is rethinking the ‘feel-good’ chemical

Dopamine: How neuroscience is rethinking the ‘feel-good’ chemical

Nature reports: When neuroscientists gather in the Spanish city of Seville in May for the annual Dopamine Society meeting, one discussion could be unusually lively. Session 31 will feature a debate between researchers who fundamentally disagree about the role dopamine has in the brain. Dopamine is one of the most extensively studied neurotransmitters, chemicals that convey signals from cell to cell. It’s the one with the highest profile outside neuroscience: often known as the ‘pleasure chemical’, it’s depicted as the…

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What happens to your brain in nature? The neuroscience explained

What happens to your brain in nature? The neuroscience explained

Yoho National Park, Field, Canada. (Unsplash/Hendrik Cornelissen) By Mar Estarellas, McGill University Have you ever felt calmer almost as soon as you step into the woods? Or maybe noticed your busy mind soften as you look out at the sea? We have known for some time, and many of us sense it intuitively, that spending time in nature is good for us. Neuroscience is now enabling us to understand why, and what the brain is actually doing in those moments….

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Using music to escape negative thought loops

Using music to escape negative thought loops

Stefan Koelsch writes: We all know the feeling: you’re trying to focus, relax or simply enjoy a quiet moment, but your mind has other plans. It wanders, replaying worries, rehearsing anxieties or drifting into a spiral of self-criticism. This internal chatter is not merely distracting – it can be emotionally draining, even painful. Have you ever, in moments like these, put on some music to help get your thoughts in order? Humans have long turned to music for solace, and…

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