Authors: Lauren Claire Fong, PhD Candidate in Cognitive Neuroscience, The University of Melbourne and Daniel Feuerriegel, Lecturer and Head of the Prediction and Decision-Making Lab, The University of Melbourne Imagine you’re in line at your favourite bakery, deciding whether to have a doughnut or a tart. You weigh them up, the doughnut wins, and you […]
Author: Henry Taylor, Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, University of Birmingham What can you see right now? This might seem like a silly question, but what enters your consciousness is not the whole story when it comes to vision. A great deal of visual processing in the brain goes on well below our conscious awareness […]
MIT neuroscientists have figured out how the brain is able to focus on a single voice among a cacophony of many voices, shedding light on a longstanding neuroscientific phenomenon known as the “cocktail party problem.” This attentional focus becomes necessary when you’re in any crowded environment, such as a cocktail party, with many conversations going […]
Have you ever wondered how your ears can pick up the faintest whisper yet also handle loud music without damage? Scientists at Rockefeller University have achieved a remarkable feat : they kept a tiny piece of cochlea alive and working outside the body, allowing them to witness the hearing process in unprecedented detail. Building a […]
When it comes to brain function, neurons get a lot of the glory. But healthy brains depend on the cooperation of many kinds of cells. The most abundant of the brain’s non-neuronal cells are astrocytes, star-shaped cells with a lot of responsibilities. Astrocytes help shape neural circuits, participate in information processing, and provide nutrient and […]
What gives rise to human consciousness? Are some parts of the brain more important than others? Scientists began tackling these questions in more depth about 35 years ago. Researchers have made progress, but the mystery of consciousness remains very much alive. In a recently published article, I reviewed over 100 years of neuroscience research to […]
One of the most famous quotes that Santiago Ramón y Cajal wrote in his work “Rules and tips on scientific research” was “Every man can, if he so desires, become the sculptor of his own brain.” . However, the use of dental material as mud and stones to model or repair sculptures probably sounded like […]
Author: Mohamady El-Gaby, Postdoctoral Neuroscientist, University of Oxford For decades, neuroscientists have developed mathematical frameworks to explain how brain activity drives behaviour in predictable, repetitive scenarios, such as while playing a game. These algorithms have not only described brain cell activity with remarkable precision but also helped develop artificial intelligence with superhuman achievements in specific […]
Author: Albert HiuKa Fok, Postdoctoral Fellow in Neuroscience, McGill University The puzzle of memory has intrigued philosophers and intellects for a very long time. Plato and Aristotle believed that memory was found only in the realm of the soul and the mind, but there was nothing corporeal or physical about it. Memory is closely tied […]
Past neuroscience and psychology studies have shown that people’s expectations of the world can influence their perceptions, either by directing their attention to expected stimuli or by reducing their sensitivity (i.e., perceptual acuity) to variations within the categories of stimuli we expect to be exposed to. While the effects of expectations on perceptions are now […]