Neuroscience

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    Brains On Purpose

  • I will be away for several days

    StephanieWestAllen
    4 Feb 2010 | 10:30 am
    I'm looking forward to writing more posts when I return.

  • Learning and the Brain: Some conferences for all of us who are teachers and learners

    StephanieWestAllen
    2 Feb 2010 | 9:35 am
    Conflict resolution is about learning. From Learn, baby, learn: Resources to help facilitate brain learning and mind changing: Resolving conflict typically requires our learning much, including the parties' positions, interests, and stories. Growing as a conflict professional requires that we be learning about ourselves, too, both in the room and away from sessions. We are not the only ones who...

  • Neurososcience "evolved from an interdisciplinary specialty to a full fledged scholarly discipline"

    StephanieWestAllen
    28 Jan 2010 | 11:12 am
    Using new methods of analysis, researchers have tracked 10 years of neuroscience. One member of the team was quoted in a release. "We wanted to map changes in science over the past decade. To do so, we started with more than 35 million citations between the articles in over 7000 scientific journals. This network of citations represents the flow of...

  • Brain talk: How to talk with your clients about neuroscience

    StephanieWestAllen
    26 Jan 2010 | 4:22 pm
    Last November, I posted a poll in a post titled Do you tell your clients about neuroscience? A quick poll. I appreciate the time and thought taken by those who responded. The first question I asked was How much information do you typically share with your clients about neuroscience? 1=Not Much, 5=Everything I Know The responses: 1 - 5.6% 2...

  • Our hidden brain: How much of an influence does it have on our decisions?

    StephanieWestAllen
    26 Jan 2010 | 3:07 pm
    For those of you always happy to learn more about the decision-making process (isn't that true of all conflict professionals?), here's a new book for you: The Hidden Brain: How Our Unconscious Minds Elect Presidents, Control Markets, Wage Wars, and Save Our Lives. Right now you can click to listen to an NPR interview of the author Shankar Vedantam; it...
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    Topix: Neuroscience

  • "I Feel Your Pain" - " The Neural Basis of Empathy

    9 Feb 2010 | 11:26 am
    Last month, a terrible earthquake raised havoc in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. While the Haitians in Port-au-Prince are miles away from us, witnessing media images of their physical and emotional suffering moves us tremendously, and motivates many of us to respond to their distress with monetary and other donations.

  • 'Zen' Bats Hit Their Target by Not Aiming at It

    9 Feb 2010 | 10:01 am
    New research conducted at the University of Maryland's bat lab shows Egyptian fruit bats find a target by NOT aiming their guiding sonar directly at it.

  • New era of pain drugs advanced by Barrow researcher

    9 Feb 2010 | 9:59 am
    Research led by a scientist at Barrow Neurological Institute at St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center has opened the door for the advancement of a new category of painkillers, called TRPV1 antagonists.

  • The mobile communication device in your head.

    9 Feb 2010 | 9:09 am
    Here's a real-life horror story: Five people have been found buried alive inside their bodies .

  • Social Studies

    9 Feb 2010 | 9:06 am
    Michael Kesterton Published on Tuesday, Feb. 09, 2010 11:14AM EST Last updated on Tuesday, Feb.
 
 
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    MIT: Neuroscience

  • Mapping the brain

    27 Jan 2010 | 9:01 pm
    C. elegans, a tiny worm about a millimeter long, doesn’t have much of a brain, but it has a nervous system — one that comprises 302 nerve cells, or neurons, to be exact. In the 1970s, a team of researchers at Cambridge University decided to create a complete “wiring diagram” of how each of those neurons are connected to one another. Such wiring diagrams have recently been christened “connectomes,” drawing on their similarity to the genome, the total DNA sequence of an organism. The C. elegans connectome, reported in 1986, took more than a dozen years of tedious labor to find.Now a…

  • Silencing the brain with light

    6 Jan 2010 | 9:00 pm
    Giving epilepsy patients an electric jolt to shut off out-of-control neuron firing during seizures is being explored as a way to treat the chronic brain disorder. New research from MIT now raises the possibility of silencing those seizures with light instead of electricity. A team led by neuroengineer Edward Boyden has found a class of proteins that, when inserted into neurons, allow them to be turned off with rays of yellow-green light. The silencing is near instantaneous and easily reversible.This kind of selective brain silencing, reported in the Jan. 7 issue of Nature, could not only help…

  • HHMI lists Tsai team’s advance among 10 biggest stories of 2009

    23 Dec 2009 | 4:54 am
    The discovery by researchers at MIT’s Picower Institute for Learning and Memory of a single DNA-packaging protein that is specifically associated with learning and memory has been named one of the 10 biggest stories of 2009 by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.The HHMI annual report honors the work of Li-Huei Tsai, the Picower Professor of Neuroscience and an HHMI investigator, whose team identified that the gene HDAC2 and its associated protein could be the target of safer, more specific drugs that promote learning when DNA in the brain unwinds from its tightly coiled…

  • Rethinking artificial intelligence

    6 Dec 2009 | 9:00 pm
    The field of artificial-intelligence research (AI), founded more than 50 years ago, seems to many researchers to have spent much of that time wandering in the wilderness, swapping hugely ambitious goals for a relatively modest set of actual accomplishments. Now, some of the pioneers of the field, joined by later generations of thinkers, are gearing up for a massive “do-over” of the whole idea.This time, they are determined to get it right — and, with the advantages of hindsight, experience, the rapid growth of new technologies and insights from the new field of computational…

  • 3 Questions: Suzanne Corkin on the world’s most famous amnesic

    30 Nov 2009 | 9:00 pm
    H.M., the well-known amnesic patient whose condition helped scientists understand memory and memory impairment, died a year ago at the age of 82. H.M. (whose full name, Henry Gustav Molaison, was disclosed only after his death) suffered from an unusual condition as a result of brain surgery to treat his epilepsy: He was unable to form new long-term memories. Before his death, H.M. and his guardian agreed that his brain would be donated to scientists for future study. MIT Professor of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Suzanne Corkin studied H.M. during his life and is now part of a team that will…
 
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    MSN: Neuroscience

  • A Conversation With Samuel Wang - New York Times

    9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am
    At his Princeton laboratory, Samuel Wang is searching for basic information on how the brains of humans and dogs work. Dr. Wang, 42, an associate professor at the university, also spends time popularizing breakthroughs in his specialty ...

  • Emory receives $2.4 million to improve humanities - Atlanta Journal Constitution

    8 Feb 2010 | 8:18 pm
    The grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation will allow the college to refocus the humanities around interdisciplinary areas and and to recruit new faculty, officials said. The university plans to create a "Society of Fellows" -- a cohort or ...

  • Brain Location for Fear of Losing Money Pinpointed -- The Amygdala - Science Daily

    8 Feb 2010 | 8:04 pm
    Researchers at the California Institute of Technology studied a phenomenon known as 'loss aversion' in two patients with lesions to the amygdala, a region deep within the brain involved in emotions and decision-making. The results of the study, part ...

  • New robot joins Three Rivers ER - TMCnet

    8 Feb 2010 | 7:54 am
    LOUISA, Feb 08, 2010 (The Daily Independent - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Three Rivers Medical Center, in partnership with St. Mary's Regional Neuroscience and Stroke Center, has acquired a RP-7 Remote Presence Robotic ...

  • Uncorrelated Activity in the Brain - Science Daily

    7 Feb 2010 | 10:43 pm
    Their findings provide detail as to how the brain accesses and processes information. "Understanding healthy neuronal activity is one of the first steps to unlocking the brains of those with illnesses such as autism," said Dr. Andreas S. Tolias ...
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    The Frontal Cortex

  • ChatRoulette

    8 Feb 2010 | 9:55 am
    Sam Anderson, in New York Magazine, takes on ChatRoulette, that strange new site that connects you, via webcam, with a stream of strangers: The site was only a few months old, but its population was beginning to explode in a way that suggested serious viral potential: 300 users in December had grown to 10,000 by the beginning of February. Although big media outlets had yet to cover it, smallish blogs were full of huzzahs. The blog Asylum called ChatRoulette its favorite site since YouTube; another, The Frisky, called it "the Holy Grail of all Internet fun." Everyone seemed to agree that it…

  • Borges Was A Neuroscientist

    5 Feb 2010 | 7:42 am
    The neuroscientist Rodrigo Quian Quiroga has written a lovely appreciation of Jorge Luis Borges in the latest Nature (not online). Quiroga focuses on Borges interest in neuroscience, which led him to write his classic short story Funes the Memorious, about a man who cannot forget: In the story of Funes, Borges described very precisely the problems of distorted memory capacities well before neuroscience caught up...In a study using electrodes to probe the hippocampus in epileptic patients for clinical reasons, we identified a type of neuron that fires in response to particular abstract…

  • The Isolated Mind

    4 Feb 2010 | 8:34 am
    Megan O'Rourke has a really eloquent and important article on the history of grieving in the New Yorker. She spends a lot of time on the life and death of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, who invented the five stages theory of human grief. (It turns out the stages don't really exist.) But I was most interested in this paragraph on the death of public funeral rituals - we no longer grieve with others, unless we're grieving over Princess Diana or Michael Jackson - and how it was driven, at least in part, by the new sciences of the mind: With the rise of psychoanalysis came a shift in attention from the…

  • Prozac

    3 Feb 2010 | 12:54 pm
    Sharon Begley has an excellent Newsweek cover story on the rise and fall of anti-depressant medications, or how a class of drugs that were once hailed as medical miracles are now seen as barely better than placebos: In just over half of the published and unpublished studies, Kirsch and colleagues reported in 2002, the drug alleviated depression no better than a placebo. "And the extra benefit of antidepressants was even less than we saw when we analyzed only published studies," Kirsch recalls. About 82 percent of the response to antidepressants--not the 75 percent he had calculated from…

  • The Blue Brain

    3 Feb 2010 | 8:23 am
    Via Vaughan at MindHacks, comes this link to a preview of a documentary-in-progress on The Blue Brain, that epic attempt to create a conscious supercomputer. I was fortunate enough to profile the Blue Brain in 2008: In the basement of a university in Lausanne, Switzerland sit four black boxes, each about the size of a refrigerator, and filled with 2,000 IBM microchips stacked in repeating rows. Together they form the processing core of a machine that can handle 22.8 trillion operations per second. It contains no moving parts and is eerily silent. When the computer is turned on, the only thing…
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    Deric Bownds' MindBlog

  • Abstract thoughts move muscles.

    9 Feb 2010 | 2:30 am
    Movements of our muscles influence our thoughts and emotions. People given neutral bland instructions to contract the specific face muscles that make a smile find it harder to generate a feeling of anger when requested to do so, and instruction to move the muscles that make an angry frown make it harder to follow a subsequent instruction to feel friendly or happy. Havas has found that blocking a frown can actually prevent a bad mood.  Natalie Angier summarizes several studies that show the opposite: how thoughts influence our muscle movements in subtle ways.  Miles et al., for…

  • The 4th anniversary of Deric's MindBlog

    8 Feb 2010 | 2:30 am
    As year five of this blog starts, I find it hard to believe that I have banged out over 2,000 postings, that the blog has ~1,500 RSS feed subscribers, and is seriously engaged by 300-400 people on an average day. (The figure is a Feedburner report, starting in July 2006.  The green line is the number of RSS subscribers, the blue indicates significant engagement, the amplitude being the weekday (new posts) - weekend (no new posts) difference). About this time of year I usually cycle through an identity crisis regarding what kind of thinking and writing I want to do, how much energy to put…

  • Religiosity tied to socioeconomic status.

    8 Feb 2010 | 2:15 am
    Gregory Paul makes an interesting comment on an article by Cullota that was the subject of my Nov. 17 post.  I think his point that belief in gods and an afterlife is unlikely to be a "strongly genetically programmed result of major selective evolutionary pressures such as social cohesion" is a good one.   But, I assume he would agree that there is genetic/development programming of things like the facial muscles that are specialized for signaling affiliative gestures that are universal across cultures. Here is his letter: The Science News Focus story "On the origin of religion" (E.

  • Our brain activity as desire collides with reason.

    5 Feb 2010 | 2:30 am
    How do we resist impulsive desires?  Apparently our anteroventral prefrontal cortex tells our nucleus accumbens and ventral tegmental  areas (involved in reward and pleasure)  to chill out. From Diekhof and Gruber: Human decisions are guided by "desire" or "reason," which control actions oriented toward either proximal or long-term goals. Here we used functional magnetic resonance imaging to assess how the human brain mediates the balance between proximal reward desiring and long-term goals, when actions promoting a superordinate goal preclude exploitation of an immediately…

  • Slime molds and humans - similar transport network design.

    4 Feb 2010 | 2:30 am
    Tero et al. show that a slime mold in one day can design a network that is as efficient as one developed by humans over many years: the Tokyo rail system. Here is their abstract, followed by two figures: Transport networks are ubiquitous in both social and biological systems. Robust network performance involves a complex trade-off involving cost, transport efficiency, and fault tolerance. Biological networks have been honed by many cycles of evolutionary selection pressure and are likely to yield reasonable solutions to such combinatorial optimization problems. Furthermore, they develop…
 
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    Eide Neurolearning Blog

  • Confessions of a Limited Working Memory Victim

    Drs. Fernette and Brock Eide
    8 Feb 2010 | 12:01 am
    A friend recommended I watch neuroscientist Jill Taylor's TED talk Stroke of Insight. In the talk, Dr. Taylor recounts her personal experiences with a stroke in her left language area. It's a remarkable lecture and a highly recommend it.But I confess, her story got me thinking about my own learning differences, and in particular, my limitation with working memory. And I thought as a neurologist, maybe it would be interesting to some of you to share how I became aware of my working memory limitations and what my experiences are with it.As it often happens, I only accidentally discovered how…

  • Why Students with Dyslexia Need Accommodations for Standardized Tests - the PSAT, SAT, and ACT

    Drs. Fernette and Brock Eide
    1 Feb 2010 | 12:01 am
    Although recent scientific research has shed light on the biological basis of dyslexia, many students with dyslexia face practical hurdles, one of the most recent in the news, a Yale medical student recently denied extended time accommodations by the United States Medical Licensing Exam for his medical boards.Word Skips and Reading Mistakes on Test QuestionsA major source of difficulty for dyslexic students occurs with misreading of test questions. Dyslexics are likely to miss small words ‘non-content’ words such as prepositions or modifiers so that re-reading of questions is necessary to…

  • Understanding Dyscalculia - the Math Learning Disability

    Drs. Fernette and Brock Eide
    25 Jan 2010 | 12:01 am
    According to the LDA:Signs and Symptoms of Dyscalculia- Shows difficulty understanding concepts of place value, and quantity, number lines, positive and negative value, carrying and borrowing- Has difficulty understanding and doing word problems- Has difficulty sequencing information or events- Exhibits difficulty using steps involved in math operations- Shows difficulty understanding fractions- Is challenged making change and handling money- Displays difficulty recognizing patterns when adding, subtracting, multiplying, or dividing- Has difficulty putting language to math processes- Has…

  • Impaired Perception of Fear Gestures in Autism

    Drs. Fernette and Brock Eide
    18 Jan 2010 | 12:01 am
    When people with autism looked at the gestures of others associated with fear, certain areas like the superior temporal sulcus (observation of goal-related gestures) had the same activation patterns as non-autistic controls, but much lover levels of activity were seen in areas such as the amygdala (emotional recognition) and putative sites of mirror neurons like the inferior frontal gyrus and dorsal premotor cortex.Problems recognizing signs of threat or fear in others means that individuals on the spectrum are at increased risk for a wide variety of difficulties, like becoming too friendly…

  • Eides Lecture on Dyslexia and Giftedness at WA International Dyslexia Assn - This Thursday Jan 14th 7 PM

    Drs. Fernette and Brock Eide
    12 Jan 2010 | 7:28 pm
    Drs. Brock and Fernette Eide will be lecturing on Dyslexia and Giftedness at The Shoreline Center, Sheridan Room 18560 First Ave NE Shoreline WA 98155 7 PM The lecture is free, but donations appreciated on behalf of the Washington Branch of the International Dyslexia Association.Clock hours are available through 24/7 Educational Services.For more information, email: info@wabida.orgEide Neurolearning Blog
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    Brain Blogger

  • “I Feel Your Pain” – The Neural Basis of Empathy

    Meghan Meyer, PhD student
    9 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am
    Last month, a terrible earthquake raised havoc in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. While the Haitians in Port-au-Prince are miles away from us, witnessing media images of their physical and emotional suffering moves us tremendously, and motivates many of us to respond to their distress with monetary and other donations. In a sense, this is an amazing human feat—that we are able to feel for other people’s far away tragedies. How is it that we are so moved? This is a question about human empathy, and it has boggled the minds of great thinkers for centuries. Indeed, German philosopher Rudolf Lotze…

  • Speaking in Tongues – A Neural Snapshot

    Dirk Hanson, MA
    7 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am
    “Asaria isa asaria ari masheetee sadabada vena amina gotaya menda meshela mosha nami ki toro ma…”Glossolalia, or speaking in tongues, has fascinated thinkers ever since the “tongues of angels” descended upon early believers as a gift from the Holy Ghost in the New Testament of the Bible. This unusual mental state, characterized by utterances that sometimes sound like an untranslated psalm from Mars, typically occurs during instances of religious excitation, and is primarily associated with Pentecostal religious practices. It has commonly been considered a form of ecstatic trance…

  • Neuro Case 1 – Using Transcranial Doppler for Basilar Artery Occlusion

    Shaheen E Lakhan, MS, MEd, PhD, MD
    5 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am
    Welcome to the first of a series of neurological cases to be featured on Brian Blogger. We will periodically choose the most enlightening cases from the Journal of Medical Case Reports (JMCR) for which I serve as an Associate Editor. I will present the case as published, discuss the implications of the findings or techniques employed, and the case author is then asked to comment on our blog to address our readers.Published by BioMed Central, JMCR “is a peer-reviewed open access journal that will consider any original case report that expands the field of general medical…

  • Journal Retracts Autism Research

    Jennifer Gibson, PharmD
    3 Feb 2010 | 7:37 am
    In 1998, a landmark study was published in the medical journal The Lancet. It was the first major research that suggested a link between the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism. Almost immediately following publication, the rates of vaccination plummeted and the incidence of measles escalated among children. Since then, the subject has been the source of much controversy, and much of the science has been disproved in other research. Now, the original journal admits it may have made a mistake in publishing the research in the first place.Recently, the United Kingdom’s General…

  • Crossing the Line from Physician to Journalist

    Jennifer Gibson, PharmD
    1 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am
    The recent coverage of the devastation and destruction after the earthquake in Haiti has had an unintended consequence; the public is now questioning the legitimacy and ethics of the physicians who masquerade as journalists.For decades, there has been an increased interest in and awareness of the need for physicians and the medical community to work more closely with journalists and the mass media to guarantee the accurate and appropriate dissemination of health information. Training programs for both physicians and journalists now include innovative curriculum to promote collaboration and…
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    Dana Press Blog

  • Study shows brain activity in patients considered “vegetative,” but with caveats

    Aalok Mehta
    5 Feb 2010 | 10:32 am
    Imaging research suggesting that some patients thought to be in vegetative states are actually at least partially conscious has made headlines the past couple days. Such work is fascinating but comes with many caveats, as Nicholas Schiff and Joseph Fins, two experts who are quoted in some coverage, wrote Dec. 4 in a guest post on this blog, about a similar finding. In the new study, which appears in the New England Journal of Medicine, European researchers found that five patients out of 54 showed patterns of brain activity in response to commands or questions from doctors. Earlier work had…

  • Kandel film wins Bavarian film award

    Aalok Mehta
    3 Feb 2010 | 11:24 am
    The director of In Search of Memory, a documentary outlining the life of Eric Kandel, was recently awardedthe Bayerischer Filmpreis, Germany’s equivalent of the Academy Award (see our previous coverage) Petra Seeger accepted the prize, a “porcelain Pierrots gingen am Freitag an „Habermann“ – für Juraj Herz' Regie und Mark Waschkes Gestaltung der TitelrollePierrot,” during the awards ceremony on Jan. 15. The film has been held over for three weeks at the IFC Center in New York and is scheduled to be shown in Cambridge, Mass. beginning April 23. Keep an eye out for it in your…

  • Can Tetris shape the brain?

    Aalok Mehta
    28 Jan 2010 | 1:01 pm
    While reading “How to Forget Fear,” a Times Online article by Alice Fishburn and science writer Ed Yong, a study on using Tetris to control fear responses caught my eye. University of Oxford researcher Emily Holmes asked people to play the block-arranging game while watching a grisly film full of surgery and accidents. “She found that while these volunteers remembered just as many details of the film as those who did not play Tetris, a week later they had fewer flashbacks and were less affected emotionally by what they had seen,” the article says. This led Holmes to hypothesize that…

  • Magnetic brain scans become more attractive

    Aalok Mehta
    26 Jan 2010 | 12:44 pm
    The first image many of us conjure up when someone mentions brain scanners—whether for medical diagnosis or basic research—is the sterile white isolation and intimidating din of a magnetic resonance imaging device. But for many diseases, the key to better diagnosis may not be looking into brains, as with MRIs, but looking near them. A new study appearing in the Journal of Neural Engineering suggests that magnetoencephalography (MEG) can identify the vast majority of people suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In MEG, a helmet surrounding the head measures the tiny…

  • A convergence of science and Supernanny

    Aalok Mehta
    25 Jan 2010 | 9:38 am
    I admit it: I watch Supernanny. And the British parenting coach now has yet another reason to tell parents to stop spanking and instead have their kids spend some time alone in the naughty chair. A new article from Scientific American details an American Psychological Association (APA) task force’s recommendations against physical punishment for children. "Psychologist Sandra A. Graham-Bermann of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, who chairs the task force, announced the recom­mendation in August at the APA’s annual meeting,” the article reads. “In a presentation, she explained…
 
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    Mind Hacks

  • Nine Legendary Hypochondriacs

    8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am
    ABC Radio National's Late Night Live has a fascinating discussion with the author of a new book on nine famous hypochondriacs: James Boswell, Charlotte Bronte, Charles Darwin, Florence Nightingale, Alice James, Daniel Paul Schreber, Marcel Proust, Glenn Gould and Andy Warhol. I'm not sure Daniel Paul Schreber is necessarily the best example of someone with hypochondria is he is famous for writing a personal account of being genuinely mentally ill and floridly psychotic. However, I've not read the book and the programme focuses on better known figures so I am open to being convinced (certainly…

  • Bonuses generate more heat than light

    6 Feb 2010 | 9:11 am
    The engaging behavioural economist Dan Ariely has just become a columnist for Wired UK and in his first article he describes how the promise of performance-related pay often backfires leading people to do more but perform worse. To see the effect of bonuses on performance, Nina Mazar (assistant professor of marketing, Toronto University), Uri Gneezy (professor of economics and strategy, University of California, San Diego), George Loewenstein (professor of economics, Carnegie Mellon, Pennsylvania) and I conducted three experiments. In one we gave subjects tasks that demanded attention,…

  • 2010-02-05 Spike activity

    5 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am
    Quick links from the past week in mind and brain news: Sex addiction is a feminist victory, according to an article in Slate, apparently because it allows man shaming. Malevolence-based medicine rears its ugly head. The BPS Research Digest covers research finding CBT-based self-help books might do more harm than good for people who worry a lot. The public are asked for their opinion on the recent news that The Lancet retracts the Wakefield autism paper, by The Onion. Neurophilosophy has an excellent piece on big news that the first evidence for navigation essential grid cells in the human…

  • Eureka brain special and more fighting

    4 Feb 2010 | 10:00 am
    The Times has just released its monthly science magazine, Eureka, with a special issue on the brain and all the articles freely available online. There doesn't seem to be a way to link to a whole issue, but inside you'll find an excellent piece on the use of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to temporarily switch off bits of the working brain, a profile of neurosurgeon Huma Sethi, an article on commercial brain-computer interfaces, a remarkable piece on how old injuries can 'return' to affect phantom limbs as well as an exploration of the link between brain activity and sporting skill.

  • Time to think

    4 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am
    Bioemphemera has found some wonderfully left-field brain illustrations by Dutch graphic designer Rhonald Blommestijn. The image on the left is a brain made out of clocks. Blommestijn's blog is full of strikingly surreal eye-candy that manages both to inspire a feeling of wide-eyed wonder and illustrate scientific themes. They're certainly very original takes on the subject and the neuroscience images are particularly vivid. Link to Bioephemera on Blommestijn's brain illustrations. Link to Blommestijn's blog.
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    Neurophilosophy

  • The cutaneous rabbit illusion hops out of the body

    4 Feb 2010 | 10:35 am
    IF a rapid series of taps are applied first to your wrist and then to your elbow, you will experience a perceptual illusion, in which phantom sensations are felt along the skin connecting the two points that were actually touched. This feels as if a tiny rabbit is hopping along your skin from the wrist to the elbow, and is therefore referred to as the "cutaneous rabbit". The illusion indicates that our perceptions of sensory inputs do not enter conscious awareness until after the integration of events occuring within a certain time window, and that the sensory events taking place at a certain…

  • Human grid cells tile the environment

    27 Jan 2010 | 9:40 am
    HOW does the brain encode the spatial representations which enable us to successfully navigate our environment? Four decades of research has identified four cell types in the brains of mice and rats which are known to be involved in these processes: place cells, grid cells, head direction cells and, most recently, border cells. Although the functions of most of these cell types are well characterized in rodents, it remains unclear whether they are also found in humans. A new functional neuroimaging study, by researchers from University College London, published online in the journal Nature,…

  • Does time dilate during a threatening situation?

    23 Jan 2010 | 7:40 am
    "WHEN a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour," said Albert Einstein, "it seems like a minute. But let him sit on a hot stove for a minute, and it's longer than any hour." Einstein was describing one of the most profound implications of his Theory of General Relativity - that the perception of time is subjective. This is something we all know from experience: time flies when we are enjoying ourselves, but seems to drag on when we are doing something tedious. The subjective experience of time can also be manipulated experimentally. Visual stimuli which appear to be approaching are perceived…

  • Single cells in the monkey brain encode abstract mathematical concepts

    21 Jan 2010 | 8:50 am
    OUR ability to use and manipulate numbers is integral to everyday life - we use them to label, rank, count and measure almost everything we encounter. It was long thought that numerical competence is dependent on language and, therefore, that numerosity is restricted to our species. Although the symbolic representation of numbers, using numerals and words, is indeed unique to humans, we now know that animals are also capable of manipulating numerical information. One study published in 1998, for example, showed that rhesus monkeys can form spontaneous representations of small numbers and use…

  • Viewing headless bodies causes face adaptation

    13 Jan 2010 | 8:40 am
    VIEWING a stimulus for a prolonged period of time results in a bias in the perception of a stimulus viewed afterwards. For example, after looking at a moving stimulus for some time, a stationary stimulus that is viewed subsequently appears to drift in the opposite direction. These after-effects reveal to us the properties of our perceptual system. They occur because the neurons which are sensitive to the initial stimulus re-calibrate their responses; they adapt to compensate for the earlier enduring stimulus, and so can continue to encode current stimuli efficiently. It was long thought that…
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    Neuroanthropology

  • SlowTV: Mind and Its Potential

    dlende
    7 Feb 2010 | 4:38 am
    The Mind and Its Potential Conference was hosted in Sydney, Australia back in November. Mind & Its Potential is your opportunity to hear the world’s top scientists, psychologists and philosophers explain how to apply the new science of the brain in education, medicine, business and your life. After we previewed it, Paul wrote up a nice review of the conference. Now SlowTV is featuring the videos of several of the talks. Michael Valenzuela, Neuroplasticity and the ‘Use it or Lose it’ Brain “Dr Michael Valenzuela describes the concept of neuroplasticity in the brain. He cites…

  • Complete this quote: “The convergence of neurology and cross-cultural research provides…”

    Paul Mason
    5 Feb 2010 | 9:59 pm
    How would you complete this unfinished quote? “The convergence of neurology and cross-cultural research provides…” At the beginning of this year, I posted a “Complete this quote” about religiosity and another about hypnotisability. At the time, I was reminded about my prior reading of Michael James Winkelman’s work about shamanism. For Winkelman, whose work is closely aligned with authors like Merlin Donald, Steven Mithen and Charles Laughlin,  “Shamanism is a part of an evolved psychology, with significant implications for human cognitive evolution…Shamanism clearly…

  • Wednesday Round Up #101

    dlende
    3 Feb 2010 | 6:49 am
    Back to the old categories approach, with thanks to my student Casey Dolezal for help. So top of the list, then anthropology and writing for a broader public, mind, a nature/culture mix of anthropology, health, and finally some good stuff on addiction at the end. Top of the List Sharon Begley, The Depressing News about Anti-Depressants Prozac Nation needs to face the data – anti-depressants don’t work as well as we thought, especially for more mild cases of depression (no better than placebos in the meta-analysis) Michael Greenwell, Howard Zinn – 1922 to 2010 The “radical historian”…

  • Access Denied

    dlende
    2 Feb 2010 | 3:49 am
    Access Denied is a great new anthropology blog on immigration and health. In particular, the editorial team focuses on the “vital global health challenge: unauthorized migrants’ and immigrants’ lack of access to health care services.” As they write about their initiative: Do unauthorized im/migrants have a right to health? To medical care? To publicly funded care? In this blog, medical anthropologists host a lively conversation among scholars, activists, policymakers and others on the complex and contentious issue of unauthorized migration and health. We approach the issue…

  • Finissez cette citation : « Comment s’effectue cette mise en mémoire culturelle ? La rèponse… »

    Paul Mason
    30 Jan 2010 | 11:35 pm
    Finissez cette citation : « Comment s’effectue cette mise en mémoire culturelle ? La rèponse… » How would you complete the following unfinished quote? “How does this cultural memory work ? The answer…” La phrase incomplète d’aujourd’hui vient de la page 372 du livre L’Homme Neuronal écrit par Professeur Jean-Pierre Changeux et publié en 1983 par Fayard. Son chapitre, Épigenèse, et le section sur l’empreinte culturelle est un important contribution a la connaissance de l’homme parmi la neuroanthropologie. Déjà en 1983, Changeux a compris : « Le paradoxe…
 
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    Neuroethics & Law Blog

  • Summer Institute in Cultural Neuroscience

    Adam Kolber
    8 Feb 2010 | 4:57 pm
    I received the announcement below via Darren Schreiber.  For more information, click here: July 19-30, 2010Center for Culture, Mind, and the BrainUniversity of MichiganAnn Arbor, MichiganCo-Directors: Shinobu Kitayama Carolyn Yoon Application Deadline:  March 1, 2010We invite you to apply to attend the first Summer Institute in Cultural Neuroscience at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. SICN is an annual two-week program that provides graduate students as well as faculty with an overview of core topics and recent research developments related to cultural neuroscience in…

  • PEBS Neuroethics Roundup from JHU Guest Blogger

    Adam Kolber
    8 Feb 2010 | 12:32 am
    Last Edition's Most Popular Article Ethical neuroscience Nature Neuroscience 2010:13:141 In the Academic Literature: Willful Modulation of Brain Activity in Disorders of Consciousness New England Journal of Medicine February 3 2010  Effects of acute psychosocial stress on working memory related brain activity in men Human Brain Mapping February 2 2010   Event-related potential and functional MRI measures of face-selectivity are highly correlated: A simultaneous ERP-fMRI investigation Human Brain Mapping February 2 2010  Emotional imagery:…

  • Letter to the Editor on Fractional Parenthood

    Adam Kolber
    5 Feb 2010 | 9:31 am
    Law professor Melanie Jacobs (Michigan State University) comments on Adam Cohen's editorial on fractional (biological) parenthood.  In her letter to the editor, Jacobs mentions a 2007 case in Pennsylvania where the "court ruled that a child could . . . have three legal parents."

  • Big News in Scanning PVS and Minimal Consciousness

    Adam Kolber
    5 Feb 2010 | 9:25 am
    Story here.

  • Comments on Westlaw/Lexis Facelifts

    Adam Kolber
    5 Feb 2010 | 9:23 am
    In an earlier post, I talked about promised user-interface upgrades from Westlaw and Lexis.  Marc Blitz adds his thoughts in a comment and an anonymous commenter (an employee of Westlaw or Lexis?) suggests that we're going to be pleasantly surprised.  I hope so!
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    Neuromarketing

  • Cookie Framing

    Roger Dooley
    9 Feb 2010 | 5:34 am
    Years ago, when The Tonight Show ruled late-night TV and when all the guests weren’t celebrities promoting their latest book, movie, or TV show, host Johnny Carson interviewed the Girl Scout who sold the most cookies that year. This young lady, Markita Andrews, set a cookie-sales record that has yet to be broken. [...] CommentsThe title of this post caught my eye immediately when it popped ... by Jon

  • Post-Super Bowl Briefing

    Roger Dooley
    8 Feb 2010 | 6:36 am
    Very soon, we will be subjected to a variety of neuromarketing-based opinions on which Super Bowl 2010 ads worked, and which didn’t. While we are awaiting these analyses, I thought I’d point readers at a good article on one kind of neuromarketing study methodology by WIRED writer Alexis Madrigal. It’s accurate, largely devoid [...] CommentsHi Roger- Thanks for the post. You are correct that we are in ... by Ron Wright

  • Neuromarketing Foes Use Subliminal Text?

    Roger Dooley
    2 Feb 2010 | 5:08 am
    Yesterday I wrote about the latest anti-neuromarketing flap in Guard Your Reptilian Brain! While researching that post, I found an interesting spinoff at another site, Progressives, South Bend. I initially couldn’t find the text “neuromarketing” on that page. When I searched the page text, I found what looked like a short horizontal [...] CommentsGreat catch Roger. As someone very famous once said : Judgment ... by christophe morinhahaha, and I even mentioned subliminals in my comment ... by Sculptor?!?Plus 2 more...

  • Guard Your Reptilian Brain!

    Roger Dooley
    1 Feb 2010 | 4:28 am
    Every year or so, some fuzzy-thinking critic reads an article about neuromarketing, becomes extremely agitated, and tries to raise the alarm about marketers turning consumers into mind-controlled zombies. The latest push of the neuro-panic button began with an article on a site called Truthout (fresh out of truth, perhaps?). Truthout seems to be a [...] CommentsThe writers from Truthout are not fully aware that the ... by CindyLet's be fair. To those who don't understand something, it's ... by Brendon ClarkPlus 7 more...

  • WIRED Throwing Biometric Super Bowl Party

    Roger Dooley
    29 Jan 2010 | 10:21 am
    Every year, there is a burst of neuromarketing-related activity coinciding with the Super Bowl. After all, that game features commercials that people actually watch, and the cost of airing each ad is the highest of any program throughout the entire year. One staple of Super Bowl Sunday is the party – millions will [...] Comments*reposted to my blog* Thanks Roger! by CindyI am a fan of neuroscience and marketing and am glad that there ... by CindyPlus 2 more...
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    SharpBrains

  • Pumping up the Brain: Reflections on the SharpBrains Virtual Summit

    Jake Dunagan
    9 Feb 2010 | 11:41 am
    On January 18-20, 2010 Alvaro Fernandez and his team at SharpBrains put together a splendid line-up of speakers on a wide range of topics related to emerging brain fitness research, technologies, and markets, and clinical cognitive and mental health issues. IFTF was proud to be a sponsor of this event. Although the conference was virtual, aside from the rigors of travel and a basket of bagels on the hallway table, my level of intellectual stimulation (and fatigue) mirrored most of my face-to-face conference experiences. It was a technical success and the content was first-rate. The conference…

  • The Evolution of Empathy

    Greater Good Magazine
    2 Feb 2010 | 6:28 am
    (Editor’s Note: we are pleased to bring you this article thanks to our collaboration with Greater Good Magazine). The Evolution of Empathy Empathy’s not a uniquely human trait, explains primatologist Frans de Waal. Apes and other animals feel it as well, suggesting that empathy is truly an essential part of who we are. Once upon a time, the United States had a president known for a peculiar facial display. In an act of controlled emotion, he would bite his lower lip and tell his audience, “I feel your pain.” Whether the display was sincere is not the issue here; how we are…

  • Will the Apple Tablet Support or Hinder Users’ Cognitive Fitness?

    Luc P. Beaudoin
    26 Jan 2010 | 7:20 am
    Rumor has it that Apple is going to announce a tablet computer, which may well become a revolutionary new way for users to read and experience all kinds of educational content. Will it support or hinder our Cognitive  Fitness? In this article, I describe the criteria that a tablet computer—and its technological ecosystem—must meet in order for the solution to make users more knowledgeable and smarter. To achieve these lofty goals, the tablet must be much more than an “e-reader”. The offering must be an integrated learning environment with which users transform the information that…

  • Cognitive Enhancement via Drugs vs. Software

    Alvaro Fernandez
    25 Jan 2010 | 1:27 pm
    SharpBrains Summit participant Peter Reiner, from the National Core for Neuroethics at the University of British Columbia, shares his main Summit take-aways on the potential and challenges of non-invasive technologies for brain fitness. He synthesizes the opportunity well: 1) Cognition is not monolithic 2) Software is adaptive 3) and seems safe, elaborating that: “Will brain fitness software dominate the world of cognitive enhancement? Prior to this conference I was quite skeptical, but the overall impression that I was left with was that brain fitness software may turn out to have some…

  • SharpBrains Summit starts today

    Alvaro Fernandez
    18 Jan 2010 | 5:16 am
    The SharpBrains Summit is ongoing, with 242 participants in 15 countries! thanks to the IT brains at the Institute for The Future and collaborators such as Anett Gyurak, Pascale Michelon and Camille Finley, event is going great. If you Twitter, you can follow my updates here. The Summit hashtag/ feed is #sharp2010. Participants who were actively tweeting the first day: @IFTFHealth @rodfalcon @positscience @billiamjames @drg @FitLifeClubs @performbetter @YoungDrivers @AOborne (Registration is closed now for new participants, please subscribe to our eNewsletter if you want to learn about future…
 
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    Brain Science Podcast Blog

  • Premium Versions of BSP 65 are now available

    Ginger Campbell, MD
    31 Jan 2010 | 4:53 pm
    Episode 65 of the Brain Science Podcast is now available in two premium versions: a 16 Track CD and as a 26 Track MP3 download. Both versions have the advertising and announcements removed. The tracks have been chosen to allow students and others to return to specific topics, and to make it easier to find your place if you are interrupted. Click here to learn more.

  • Podcast Extra: Bruce Hood on Believing the Unbelievable

    Ginger Campbell, MD
    29 Jan 2010 | 10:05 am
    Episode 34 of Books and Ideas is an interview with Bruce M Hood, author of SuperSense: Why We Believe in the Unbelievable.Dr. Hood is a developmental psychologist with a long-standing interest in why people believe weird things. In SuperSense he argues that innate cognitive structures (how we think without being taught) give people a natural tendency toward belief in the supernatural. Our intuitive sense of how the world works is often at odds with the findings of modern science. In this interview we discuss the evidence for these conclusions and their implications. Listen to Episode 34 of…

  • BSP 65: Affective Neuroscience with Jaak Panksepp

    Ginger Campbell, MD
    13 Jan 2010 | 2:40 am
    Episode 65 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Jaak Panksepp, PhD, author ofAffective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions. Dr. Panksepp has done pioneering work on the neural origins of emotions. In this interview we discuss how his work challenges some of the common assumptions about emotions and some of the important implications of his discoveries. New listeners may want to go back and listen to Episode 11 for an introduction to the neuroscience of emotion. Listen to Episode 65 (Free Podcast version) Episode Transcript (Download PDF) Subscribe to the…

  • BSP Fans are enthusiastic about Newsletter

    Ginger Campbell, MD
    16 Dec 2009 | 7:11 am
    I have been getting a great response to the BSP Newsletter, but those of you who receive blog posts via email don’t seem to be getting the sign-up form. If you want to sign up just Click Here to go the sign-up page or go to http://docartemis.com/brainsciencepodcast/newsletter/.

  • Brain Science Podcast launches Newsletter

    Ginger Campbell, MD
    13 Dec 2009 | 12:04 pm
    I am launching a newsletter for the Brain Science PodcastIf you sign up you will get the show notes for future episodes of the Brain Science Podcast as well as occasional announcements
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    NeuroLogica Blog

  • NeuroLogica Is Back

    Steven Novella
    9 Feb 2010 | 7:21 am
    Many readers noticed that we were down for a few days. What happened was that I was given a very kind mention in an article in the LA Times (along with some of my fellow skeptical bloggers). This had the very nice effect of sending a pulse of traffic to my blog. However, this traffic exceeded the limits of my host, HostPapa, for simultaneous users. HostPapa responded by (without warning) permanently suspending my account, and putting up a friendly notice for all to see, making it seem like I haven’t been paying my bills. Now that’s customer service. I noticed right away and…

  • Desiree Jennings – The Plot Thickens

    Steven Novella
    5 Feb 2010 | 5:45 am
    As promised, I watched the Inside Edition segment last night following up on the Desiree Jennings case. If you remember, she is the 25 year old woman who claimed to have a neurological disorder called dystonia following a seasonal flu vaccine. Her story never added up, and the video of her disorder that was made public (and disseminated, of course, on YouTube) did not show dystonia. Every neurologist who viewed the video and commented publicly, including me, were of the opinion that her symptoms were psychogenic. The question at hand is whether or not she has a neurological disorder and…

  • Desiree Jennings Follow UP

    Steven Novella
    4 Feb 2010 | 9:39 am
    I was recently interviewed by Inside Edition for a follow up story on Desiree Jennings – the young woman who alleged to have dystonia as a reaction to the flu vaccine. (See here for my original post, and there are a few follow ups shortly after.) Inside Edition initially broke the story nationally, and did not do a very good job  – they basically accepted the story at face value and did not consult appropriate experts to give proper context to the story. Well, it seems that they are now willing to do a follow up report and even try to correct their prior reporting. The show in…

  • More on fMRIs and the Comatose

    Steven Novella
    4 Feb 2010 | 5:41 am
    Dealing with patients in a coma is challenging in multiple levels. We are challenged to evaluate the degree of damage, or conversely the degree of neurological function that remains. We are challenged to give the family or caregiver an accurate prognosis. And we are challenged with dealing with the ethical and emotional issues that surround such cases. All of these challenges would be helped by improving our ability to accurately assess such patients – and fortunately we are making some progress in this area. I have previously discussed research in which a woman in an apparently…

  • Biophysical250 – Neurotics-R-Us

    Steven Novella
    3 Feb 2010 | 7:45 am
    I was recently asked my opinion about the Biophysical250 – a series of 250 blood tests offered by a commercial lab for the out-of-pocket cost of $3,400. My skeptical alarms immediately began ringing – I am familiar with the commercial labs promising diagnostic tests directly to the public – generally not a good idea. I checked out their website, which set off more alarms. The first thing you see, in the upper left corner, is this: Would you like to get back the vibrancy and passion you enjoyed when you were younger? Are there things you would like to be doing at work or with…
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    WordPress Tag: Neuroscience

  • Three Years!

    iceman18
    9 Feb 2010 | 5:31 am
    1,096 days, 42 minutes and 94694685 heart beats, so says the sobriety calculator.  I say that it’s good to be alive and celebrating 3 years of being alcohol free – today! Graced!  That is how I feel today.  I don’t think of myself as being any sort of deeply religious person, but no better word describes how I feel.  I now realize that taking alcohol out of my body placed me at the starting line of life.  Not a new life, but one that has given me the opportunity to learn who I am.  It has given me the opportunity to put my “false self” behind me and to…

  • Some links #1

    wintz
    9 Feb 2010 | 4:06 am
    Having now returned, I feel a long list of links is needed to kick start things: The journal Biolinguistics now has a blog. Whether or not this turns out to be interesting will obviously depend on the role they adopt for the blog. At the moment it just seems to be promoting various conferences and a summer school. I’ve added their RSS to google reader, so we shall see if anything worth while pops up. Peter Frost over at Evo and Proud has written a fascinating article about the late Claude Lévi-Strauss and his view that “cultural differences have, over time, produced biological…

  • Volunteers Requested for Science Olympiad Clinic

    Mark Willis
    9 Feb 2010 | 2:05 am
    James Olson, Ph.D., is organizing Wright State University’s third annual clinic for local students participating in Science Olympiad. He is seeking graduate students and faculty who are willing to help with presentation of instructional materials for the Science Olympiad students. The clinic will take place on the Wright State main campus on Saturday, March 13, and will run from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. High school students will attend the clinic from 9 a.m. to noon and middle school students will attend from 1 to 4 p.m. Clinic presenters will have a free lunch between noon and 1 p.m. For more…

  • Neuroscience Seminars - Spring

    Sarah R-H
    8 Feb 2010 | 11:47 pm
    Seminars are held at 4;30 in the Genome Damage and Stability Centre seminar room on the ground floor. 8th Feb Mike Land, Sussex, “Seeing what is behind one’s head” 15th Feb John Garthwaite. University College London “Nitric oxide-mediated transmission: how does it work?” 22nd Feb Heather Berlin, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, NY, “The Neural Basis of Impulsivity and Emotion Regulation: What we can learn from clinical studies” NB SPECIAL SEMINAR: 25th February (!!THURSDAY!! usual time and place Brian Smith “Associative and nonassociative plasticity tunes…

  • Book Response

    space0junkie
    8 Feb 2010 | 9:12 pm
    Jay Ingram - The Burning House The Burning House Unlocking the Mysteries of the Brain By Jay Ingram A Book Response V******** Who really knows what the brain is really capable of, and how it works. Many researches have been made about the mysteries of the human brain but can’t really grasp it. So they found a few things such as how the brain functions and some of its elements but have they fully understand what the brain is truly capable of? Many people think that the bigger the brain the smarter they are, but it’s only half true. There are other factors that are also important that…
 
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    Journal of Neurology

  • Remote cerebral hematomas in patients treated with intravenous rt-PA

    5 Feb 2010 | 9:53 am
    Abstract  The frequency, clinical presentation, radiological features, and prognosis of remote cerebral hematomas (rPH) are not well known. We report our experience in patients treated with intravenous rt-PA. We reviewed our database of consecutive patients treated at our hospital from 1999 to 2008. We used the inclusion/exclusion criteria of the ECASS-2 study from 1999 to 2003, and the criteria of the SITS-MOST study since 2004. A follow-up CT scan was obtained in all of the patients within the first 36 h of treatment. Cerebral hemorrhagic complications were classified as…

  • Spontaneous regression of a midbrain lesion in a patient with chronic transtentorial herniation: is it a pre-syrinx?

    5 Feb 2010 | 9:53 am
    Spontaneous regression of a midbrain lesion in a patient with chronic transtentorial herniation: is it a pre-syrinx? Content Type Journal ArticleCategory Letter to the EditorsDOI 10.1007/s00415-010-5460-4Authors Alessandro Cianfoni, Neuroradiology Section, Radiology Department Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) Charleston USAMaria da Graca Morais Martin, Clinics Hospital of the University of Sao Paulo Department of Radiology Sao Paulo BrazilMarco Luigetti, Catholic University of Sacred Heart Department of Neurology Rome ItalyBenedetta Ludovica Pettorini, Catholic University of Sacred…

  • Early development of spasticity following stroke: a prospective, observational trial

    5 Feb 2010 | 9:53 am
    Abstract  This study followed a cohort of 103 patients at median 6 days, 6 and 16 weeks after stroke and recorded muscle tone, pain, paresis, Barthel Index and quality of life score (EQ-5D) to identify risk-factors for development of spasticity. 24.5% of stroke victims developed an increase of muscle tone within 2 weeks after stroke. Patients with spasticity had significantly higher incidences of pain and nursing home placement and lower Barthel and EQ-5D scores than patients with normal muscle tone. Early predictive factors for presence of severe spasticity [modified…

  • Frequency of dementia, depression, and other neuropsychiatric symptoms in 1,449 outpatients with Parkinson’s disease

    5 Feb 2010 | 9:53 am
    Abstract  Neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) of Parkinson’s disease (PD) are of growing diagnostic and therapeutic importance. Data on their prevalence and characteristics have been primarily derived from highly selective clinical populations. We have conducted a national study in the outpatient care sector to provide a fuller characterization of the frequency of dementia, depression, and other NPS in PD outpatients. We also examined associations with biosocial and neurological variables. A nationwide representative sample of 1,449 PD outpatients was examined with a standardized…

  • Treatment of anti-glutamic acid decarboxylase antibody-associated limbic encephalitis with mycophenolate mofetil

    3 Feb 2010 | 9:55 am
    Treatment of anti-glutamic acid decarboxylase antibody-associated limbic encephalitis with mycophenolate mofetil Content Type Journal ArticleCategory Letter to the EditorsDOI 10.1007/s00415-010-5476-9Authors Shiv Saidha, University College Hospital, Galway and National University of Ireland Department of Neurology Galway IrelandS. Murphy, University College Hospital, Galway and National University of Ireland Department of Neurology Galway IrelandA. Ronayne, University College Hospital, Galway and National University of Ireland Department of Neurology Galway IrelandP. McCarthy, University…
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    Journal of Neuroscience

  • Vibrissa-Based Object Localization in Head-Fixed Mice

    O'Connor, D. H., Clack, N. G., Huber, D., Komiyama, T., Myers, E. W., Svoboda, K.
    3 Feb 2010 | 10:46 am
    Linking activity in specific cell types with perception, cognition, and action, requires quantitative behavioral experiments in genetic model systems such as the mouse. In head-fixed primates, the combination of precise stimulus control, monitoring of motor output, and physiological recordings over large numbers of trials are the foundation on which many conceptually rich and quantitative studies have been built. Choice-based, quantitative behavioral paradigms for head-fixed mice have not been described previously. Here, we report a somatosensory absolute object localization task for…

  • Erratum for Satz et al., Visual Impairment in the Absence of Dystroglycan

    3 Feb 2010 | 10:46 am

  • Medial Frontal Cortex Motivates But Does Not Control Movement Initiation in the Countermanding Task

    Scangos, K. W., Stuphorn, V.
    3 Feb 2010 | 10:46 am
    Voluntary control of behavior implies the ability to select what action is performed. The supplementary motor area (SMA) and pre-SMA are widely considered to be of central importance for this ability because of their role in movement initiation and inhibition. To test this hypothesis, we recorded from neurons in SMA and pre-SMA of monkeys performing an arm countermanding task. Temporal analysis of neural activity and behavior in this task allowed us to test whether neural activity is sufficient to control movement initiation or inhibition. Surprisingly, 99% (242 of 243) of movement-related…

  • Single-Unit Activity in Piriform Cortex during Slow-Wave State Is Shaped by Recent Odor Experience

    Wilson, D. A.
    3 Feb 2010 | 10:46 am
    Memory and its underlying neural plasticity play important roles in sensory discrimination and cortical pattern recognition in olfaction. Given the reported function of slow-wave sleep states in neocortical and hippocampal memory consolidation, we hypothesized that activity during slow-wave states within the piriform cortex may be shaped by recent olfactory experience. Rats were anesthetized with urethane and allowed to spontaneously shift between slow-wave and fast-wave states as recorded in local field potentials within the anterior piriform cortex. Single-unit activity of piriform cortical…

  • Distinct Representations and Theta Dynamics in Dorsal and Ventral Hippocampus

    Royer, S., Sirota, A., Patel, J., Buzsaki, G.
    3 Feb 2010 | 10:46 am
    Although anatomical, lesion, and imaging studies of the hippocampus indicate qualitatively different information processing along its septo-temporal axis, physiological mechanisms supporting such distinction are missing. We found fundamental differences between the dorsal (dCA3) and the ventral-most parts (vCA3) of the hippocampus in both environmental representation and temporal dynamics. Discrete place fields of dCA3 neurons evenly covered all parts of the testing environments. In contrast, vCA3 neurons (1) rarely showed continuous two-dimensional place fields, (2) differentiated open and…
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    Neurology Product Guide

  • Skin Cells Converted to Brain cells; Herald the Emergence of New Era

    Jim Marino
    27 Jan 2010 | 10:23 pm
    Scientists are heralding a major leap forward in dementia treatment after transforming skin cells into brain cells. The pioneering study raises the hope that doctors could create nerve cells to inject into the brains of Alzheimer’s patients to repair damage. The researchers, who report their breakthrough in the journal Nature, used just three genes to transform mouse skin cells into nerve cells, called neurons. The converted skin cells could also be used to treat Parkinson’s disease or heal damaged spinal cords, it is hoped. Dr Irving Weissman, from Stanford University in…

  • Zebrafish Behavior Monitoring System Could Boost Drug Discovery: UBC-Harvard Research

    Jim Marino
    20 Jan 2010 | 11:39 pm
    Researchers from the University of British Columbia and Harvard University have co-developed a system that captures on video and barcodes the behavioral responses of zebrafish to chemical compounds on a large scale. The approach could dramatically speed up the discovery of new psychiatric drugs. It can track the behavioral effects of up to 14,000 chemicals at a time and has already identified new chemicals that affect behaviour in fish. For the full story, Click Here

  • New Epigenetic Study Shows A Link Between Maternal Diet And Brain Development In Gestating Mice

    Jim Marino
    8 Jan 2010 | 3:47 am
    A new research study led by a team of University of North Carolina researchers shows that choline plays a critical role in helping fetal brains develops regions associated with memory. Choline is found in meats, including pork, as well as chicken eggs. Two groups of pregnant mice were fed different diets during the window of time when a fetus develops its hippocampus, that part of the brain responsible for memory. For the full story, Click Here

  • Virtual Radiologic Completes Deployment of vRad® PACS

    Jim Marino
    29 Dec 2009 | 7:08 am
    Virtual Radiologic Corporation has completed the deployment of vRad® PACS, its proprietary picture communications and archiving system for radiologic case processing. Replacing previously used commercial software, vRad PACS is now being used by all of the Company’s 140 affiliated radiologists to perform clinical interpretations on radiologic cases transmitted in real-time from over 7,400 different image sending devices located at more than 1,150 medical facilities across the United States. For the full story, Click Here

  • Dutch researchers explore advanced brain diagnostic techniques

    Jim Marino
    23 Dec 2009 | 2:14 am
    Medisch Spectrum Twente Hospital (MST) researchers have developed several quantitative EEG techniques for the purposes of EEG monitoring, one of them being the Brain Symmetry Index. BSI extracts the essential data from an EEG and converts it into a clear signal, or even into written text. An initial prototype is already undergoing evaluation in an intensive care setting. Further development will take place in close collaboration with MST and the University Medical Centre in Nijmegen. For the full story, Click Here
 
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    The Neurocritic

  • Psychodynamic Psychotherapy in the Scanner?

    6 Feb 2010 | 8:28 pm
    Arrangement for psychotherapy fMRI studies using the couch of Sigmund Freud[No not really, although the authors did stretch the implications of their findings in the Discussion...]Whether the proprietors of this blog want to admit it or not, neuropsychoanalysis appears to be a new field of study. What does psychoanalysis do to the brain? In a new Psychotherapy Research paper, Loughead et al. (2010) collected autobiographical relationship narratives from 16 healthy control participants free of any psychiatric or neurological ailments. These types of vignettes were used as stimuli because…

  • Mirror Neurons and Magical EFT Therapy Bears

    27 Jan 2010 | 10:23 pm
    Magic Buttons BearEmotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) is a form of alternative therapy thatpurports to manipulate the body's energy field by tapping on acupuncture points while a specific traumatic memory is focused on, in order to alleviate a psychological problem. Critics have described the theory behind EFT as pseudoscientific and have suggested that any utility stems from its more traditional cognitive components, such as the placebo effect, distraction from negative thoughts, rather than from manipulation of meridians.EFT, a form of Thought Field Therapy (TFT), has been thoroughly…

  • Call for Submissions: 6th Annual Best Visual Illusion of the Year Contest!

    26 Jan 2010 | 11:19 pm
    The contest will be held on May 10th at 5pm Submissions for the 2010 contest are now welcome.Submit your ideas now and take home this prestigious award! Direct queries to: Susana Martinez-Conde(Neural Correlate Society president)For more information, visit the contest website

  • Tonight on the Resting State Network...

    22 Jan 2010 | 12:35 am
    From NeuroImage, via Björn Brembs.

  • This aspirin is dictatorial, prosaic, and selfish

    19 Jan 2010 | 2:43 am
    Fig. 2 (Schaefer & Rotte, 2010 Example of a questionnaire used to form a semantic differential for one particular brand. Subjects had to rate the brands according to their relationships to 18 pairs of contrary adjectives.The nascent field of neuromarketing has grown tremendously in the last 5 years. Its goal is to use brain imaging techniques such as fMRI and EEG to gain hidden insights into consumer preferences. Commercial applications have far outstripped the peer-reviewed science necessary to validate their use. Google returns 322,000 hits for the term neuromarketing, whereas PubMed…
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    Sports Are 80 Percent Mental

  • Month Of Birth Determines Success In Sports

    7 Feb 2010 | 6:51 pm
    The month of your birth influences your chances of becoming a professional sportsperson, an Australian researcher has found.  Senior research fellow Dr. Adrian Barnett from Queensland University of Technology's Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation studies the seasonal patterns of population health and found the month you were born in could influence your future health and fitness. The results of the study are published in the book Analysing Seasonal Health Data, by Barnett, co-authored by researcher Professor Annette Dobson from the University of Queensland. Barnett analysed the…

  • Swiss Team Bobbing For Gold In Vancouver

    5 Feb 2010 | 7:02 pm
    Switzerland has a long tradition of bobsledding and the Swiss Bobsleigh Federation has a remarkable record at international competitions. Currently, Switzerland even boasts two reigning world champions: Ivo Rüegg in the two-man bob and junior world champion Sabina Hafner. Moreover, pilot Beat Hefti won last year’s world cup season – also in the two-man bob. To be better than the rest, the athletes not only need talent and experience, but also a fast bobsled. No one knows this better than former bobsledder and leader of the “CITIUS” project, Christian Reich: “for a pilot, being able…

  • Exercise May Help Schizophrenia Patients

    3 Feb 2010 | 7:23 pm
    Potentially beneficial brain changes (an increase in the volume of an area known as the hippocampus) occur in response to exercise both in patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls, according to a report in the February issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. The findings suggest that the brain retains some plasticity, or ability to adapt, even in those with psychotic disorders. Schizophrenia is known to be associated with a reduced volume in the area of the brain known as the hippocampus, which helps regulate emotion and memory, according to…

  • Soccer Referees Biased Against Tall Players

    1 Feb 2010 | 6:23 pm
    In this World Cup year, when football (soccer) passions are running high, supporters might be forgiven for objecting to every decision to award a foul against their team, made by referees. But they might also have a point. Researchers at Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University have researched all recorded fouls in three major football competitions over seven years. They discovered an ambiguous foul is more likely to be attributed to the taller of two players. Dr. Niels van Quaquebeke and Dr. Steffen Giessner, scientists at Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University began…

  • Stroke Patients Benefit From New Brain And Motor Skills Research

    30 Jan 2010 | 12:11 pm
    Bioengineers have taken a small step toward improving physical recovery in stroke patients by showing that a key feature of how limb motion is encoded in the nervous system plays a crucial role in how new motor skills are learned. Published in a recent issue of Neuron, a Harvard-based study about the neural learning elements responsible for motor learning may help scientists design rehabilitation protocols in which motor adaptation occurs more readily, potentially allowing for a more rapid recovery. Neuroscientists have long understood that the brain's primary motor cortex and the body's…
 
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    The Brain Understanding Itself

  • Healing the Brain 2010

    Alex Doman
    1 Feb 2010 | 12:20 pm
    The Klinghardt Academy of Neurobiology is holding a conference in Bellevue, Washington this month called Healing the Brain 2010. I will be presenting a talk titled Applications of Music Listening Therapy.  If you are interested in leading edge protocols for brain health, this conference will be well worth your time. HEALING THE BRAIN CONFERENCE 2010 February 19-22, 2010 Hyatt Regency Bellevue, SeattleIn recent years ALS, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s disease, autism and other disorders of the central nervous system are increasing exponentially. Something is happening. What is it?

  • Music Shown to Improve Communication in Toddlers with Cochlear Implants

    Alex Doman
    7 Jan 2010 | 2:59 pm
    A new study reveals that music activities can improve communication in toddlers who have received cochlear implants. Some infants who are born with impaired hearing and who cannot benefit from hearing aids are likely to gain 90% normal hearing ability by undergoing a cochlear implantation procedure. Following the operation, however, the child — who never heard before — undergoes a long rehabilitation process before he or she can begin to speak. In the present study, Dr. Dikla Kerem of the University of Haifa examined the particular effects that music therapy has on the potential…

  • Webinar-The Listening Program and Autism Spectrum Disorders

    Alex Doman
    18 Dec 2009 | 5:24 pm
    If you have an interest in learning more about The Listening Program® method of music listening therapy please join me for a live webinar this Sunday organized by the Akhil Autism Foundation. The Listening Program® (TLP) is a music listening therapy that provides engaging brain stimulation to improve performance in school, work and life. This introductory webinar is free and will provide an overview of  the auditory system, auditory processing, and how music listening therapy can help improve the life of a child on the autism spectrum. Date: Sunday, Dec. 20, 2009 Times: USA  11:00 AM…

  • Music Program Helps Children with Down Syndrome

    Alex Doman
    11 Dec 2009 | 9:14 am
    Hearing and speech are common challenges for children with Down Syndrome or Trisomy 21.  Susceptible to chronic ear fluid and infections, auditory development is a crucial area of  focus when taking a comprehensive approach to helping these children reach their innate potential. If hearing is impacted, so is  listening, auditory processing,  receptive and expressive language, and cognitive function. One broken link in the chain creates a domino effect in terms of  development of learning, behavior and communication. Music listening therapy is a viable intervention for children with Down…

  • Mozart Soothes Premature Babies

    Alex Doman
    9 Dec 2009 | 12:23 pm
    My wife and I just returned from an appointment with our OB to check on the progress of our son Brendan who is due to arrive in January.  As an expectant father and producer of therapeutic music programs I am a huge believer in the positive benefits of exposing our son to music in utero and beyond. So,  I just opened my email and sitting in my Inbox is a study forwarded to me by my friend and collaborator Don Campbell that demonstrates that Mozart soothes premature babies.  Now, this is no revelation for those of us in the field, but it it gratifying to see researchers continue to study…
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    Brain Posts

  • Depression Treatment Improves Diabetes Control

    8 Feb 2010 | 10:07 am
    Depression appears common in those with diabetes. Depression may influence the outcome of diabetes through a variety of mechanisms. One mechanism is reduced motivation and drive to comply with dietary, exercise and pharamacological recommendations.Echeverry et al recently published results of a depression intervention in a serious of patients with diabetes. The population for this study was a group of low-income individuals of Hispanic and African American race and ethnicity.Patients were screened for depression using a two-question screen called the Whooley two-question tool. Question 1 is…

  • Losing Weight Using Your Cell Phone

    2 Feb 2010 | 8:43 am
    Several studies have now demonstrated the potential for cell phones and text messages to help in the battle against obesity.How do these types of programs work? The free text article by Patrick et al (see below for link) outlines a typical program. Participants receive daily text messages customized to the individual. Text messages are typically sent in the morning and evening. Additional messages may be sent throughout the day.Message topics change weekly through the period of intervention. The topics include dietary and behavioral strategies for weight loss such as goal setting, weight…

  • The Uniqueness of Humans: TED Talk by Robert Sapolsky

    22 Jan 2010 | 8:55 am
    Robert Sapolsky recently gave a commencement address at Stanford University. A primatologist, Sapolsky summarized what makes humans unique. I've posted the TED video above and made notes below from his presentation. You can advance the YouTube video to about 5 minutes to bypass the introduction or go to the TED site here.Humans are unique but it is not related to our genetic structure. We share the vast majority of genes with primates. We have challenges in making sense of human uniqueness. We share many more features than unique features with the animal world. Humans are not the only species…

  • Sleep Disturbances in Women with Eating Disorders

    19 Jan 2010 | 1:47 pm
    A recent brief report from Psychiatry Research examined the prevalence and correlates of sleep problems in women with eating disorders.This Korean study examined self report for 5 types of sleep problems: difficulty falling asleep, midsleep awakenings, early morning awakenings, parasomnia (i.e. sleep walking) and hypersomnia.Subjects were a series of 400 women seeking treatment from an outpatient mental health facility. The key findings from the study include:Prevalence of any sleep disturbance rate was estimated at 50.3% of the population.Sleep disturbance occurred at higher rates in…

  • Testosterone Augmentation for Type 2 Diabetes in Men

    17 Jan 2010 | 10:51 am
    Some of the effects of testosterone decline in older men may contribute to the risk for type 2 diabetes and the metabolic syndrome. A recent small German study examined the effect of testosterone gel augmentation to diet and exercises in male diabetics. Entry into the study was limited to men with low endogenous levels of testosterone. All the men received instruction in diet and exercise. Half (16) of the subjects received 50 mg of testosterone gel, the other half did not. The men were followed for 52 weeks. Outcome measures included hemoglobin A1C levels ( a measure of blood glucose…
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    Brain Training 101

  • Watch Live Brain Surgery On The Today Show

    Erin
    3 Feb 2010 | 7:52 am
      This morning I watched an inspiring and deceptively simplified video of brain surgery broadcast live via the Today Show. The patient is 81 year old Ben Colbert who suffers from Essential Tremor, a progressive neurological condition which can cause trembling in the hands, head or legs. Simply keeping his food on a plate became a task he could not complete, so he underwent neurosurgery on the left part of his brain which stopped the trembling in his right hand. While regaining control of his dominant hand enabled him to return to tasks such as writing checks, Ben quickly realized he…

  • The Moon Illusion – Photos From Last Night

    Erin
    30 Jan 2010 | 12:48 pm
    The Moon Illusion, January 2010, Phoenix, AZ. ©Erin Matlock Last night I headed out for a hike around sunset to catch The Moon Illusion. This phenomenon occurs once or twice a year when the moon is at its closest point to us – and is full. Doing a search on the web turns up quite a few different explanations for the illusion – and a great deal of debate. There is one agreement, though. It is a fantastic sight! The following is background information provided by Nasa with links at the conclusion for further resources. I’ve also included some photos I took of the event.

  • Take The Brain Training Poll

    Erin
    23 Jan 2010 | 8:52 pm
    We’re starting a new feature here at Brain Training 101 – Polls! Periodically we’ll have a new poll up on the homepage and would love to see your answers. Here’s our first one. Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll. Similar Posts: Brain Test Britain – Does Brain Training Really Work? Kickstart Your Brain With Brain Fitness Boot Camp Brain Fitness Pro For The iPhone Brain Training On The Web

  • The Human Spark – Brain Matters

    Erin
    18 Jan 2010 | 11:59 am
    In Brain Matters, the third installment of the PBS special, The Human Spark, host Alan Alda looks within his own brain in order to give us insight as to just what makes humans unique. After some three and a half billion years of life’s evolution on this planet – and after almost two million years since people recognizable as human first walked its surface – a new human burst upon the scene, apparently unannounced. It was us. – from the website The series aims to answer three questions. What is the nature of human uniqueness? Where did the Human Spark ignite, and when? And perhaps…

  • Brain Test Britain – Does Brain Training Really Work?

    Erin
    9 Jan 2010 | 4:25 pm
    Last week I was contacted by Brain Test Britain, the BBC sponsored brain training experiment looking to further document the effects of actively training our brains. They were looking for some insight as to what it is we do here at Brain Training 101, and what types of people are currently doing some sort of brain training. If you haven’t heard of Brain Test Britain, you’ll want to check it out. The study is currently open and looking for new participants. You’ll be asked to register and complete a benchmarking test to give researchers an idea of your brain function starting…
 
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    Psychology Headlines Around the World

  • High Sensitivity to Stress Isn't Always Bad for Children

    Medical News Today
    8 Feb 2010 | 3:58 am
    Source: Medical News TodayChildren who are especially reactive to stress are more vulnerable to adversity and have more behavior and health problems than their peers. But a new longitudinal study suggests that highly reactive children are also more likely to do well when they're raised in supportive environments. The study, by scientists at the University of British Columbia, the University of California, San Francisco, and the University of California, Berkeley, appears...

  • Neurons for Peace: Take the Pledge, Brain Scientists

    New Scientist - Latest Headlines
    8 Feb 2010 | 3:57 am
    Source: New Scientist - Latest HeadlinesIt's time for neuroscience to catch up with other professions and pledge not to support aggressive war and torture, says Curtis Bell.

  • Potential Evolutionary Role for Same-Sex Attraction

    ScienceDaily
    8 Feb 2010 | 3:57 am
    Source: ScienceDailyMale homosexuality doesn't make complete sense from an evolutionary point of view. One possible explanation is what evolutionary psychologists call the "kin selection hypothesis." What that means is that homosexuality may convey an indirect benefit by enhancing the survival prospects of close relatives.

  • Novel Helps Overweight Girls Lose Weight, Gain Self-Esteem

    USA Today - Top Stories
    8 Feb 2010 | 3:57 am
    Source: USA Today - Top StoriesA Duke University study found that Rescue Lake, which features an overweight protagonist, inspired girls ages 9 to 13 to get ...

  • APA Says Pentagon and Congress Should Quickly End Gay Military Ban

    Medical News Today
    7 Feb 2010 | 12:34 am
    Source: Medical News TodayThe American Psychological Association urged both the Pentagon and Congress to move swiftly to end the restrictions on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military, noting that there are decades of scientific research demonstrating no threat to military readiness or morale. "While we were heartened by the congressional testimony of Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Admiral Mike Mullen, we believe that a year to study the matter and another...
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    N e u r o n a r r a t i v e

  • What Zaps a High Achiever’s Performance Lights a Low Achiever’s Fire

    David DiSalvo
    25 Jan 2010 | 2:41 pm
    High achievers do many things well, particularly when they’re convinced that excellence requires their utmost performance.  Low achievers, however, have a hard time getting motivated and often find themselves coughing in the dust of the high achievers’ hustle. But like so many generalizations, this one has a limit.    A new study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology uncovered a variable that knocks this scenario on its head, and it has everything to do with what makes low achievers tick. Researchers conducted multiple studies to evaluate how participants’ attitudes…

  • Does Making a Public Commitment Really Help People Lose Weight?

    David DiSalvo
    9 Jan 2010 | 7:34 pm
    Several of the most popular weight loss programs operate on the public commitment principle. Individuals are challenged to state “publicly” (which may simply mean in front of a small weight loss group) that they want to lose so much weight in a given time period. The commitment hinges on social pressure working against the possibility of failure.  If someone doesn’t succeed, or at least make substantial progress toward the goal, everyone will know it.  On the face of it, this principle seems sound, since no one wants to be publicly embarrassed or viewed as a hypocrite. In practice,…

  • Are Social Networks Messing with Your Head?

    David DiSalvo
    31 Dec 2009 | 7:47 am
    I have a feature article in the January/February issue of Scientific American Mind about the psychoemotional effects of social networking. A preview of the article is online here, and hard copy is available on newsstands.   Several months back I started following the debate about the role of social network sites like Facebook in fostering loneliness, affecting self-esteem and bolstering narcissism. As is often the case, the debate seemed more about presuppositions and agendas, and less about evidence.  This article puts the emphasis solidly on evidence by reviewing a range of research…

  • Power Makes the Hypocrite Bolder and Smugger

    David DiSalvo
    29 Dec 2009 | 1:44 pm
    We’ve all had the experience of listening to someone in a position of power rail against the moral ineptitude of others. Turn on the news on any given day and you’re likely to see someone moralizing about family values, for example.  Most of us listen to these diatribes and wonder if those doing the judging would fare well under judgment—though we strongly suspect they would not. A new study that will be published in a forthcoming issue of Psychological Science confirms our suspicions. Researchers investigated whether people in positions of power that hold high standards for others…

  • What’s More Potent, Testosterone or the Power of Belief?

    David DiSalvo
    17 Dec 2009 | 12:53 pm
    When most people think of testosterone, words like “aggression,” “dominance,” and “violence” usually come to mind.  Those words are memetically linked with testosterone the way “expensive” is linked with diamonds, and most of us have adopted the linkage without thinking much about it.  Collectively, we’ve adopted a “folk hypothesis” about testosterone–a generalized presupposition grounded in folk wisdom assumed to be correct. What makes folk hypotheses noteworthy is that they’re hard to challenge–not…
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    The Neurocritic

  • Psychodynamic Psychotherapy in the Scanner?

    6 Feb 2010 | 8:28 pm
    Arrangement for psychotherapy fMRI studies using the couch of Sigmund Freud[No not really, although the authors did stretch the implications of their findings in the Discussion...]Whether the proprietors of this blog want to admit it or not, neuropsychoanalysis appears to be a new field of study. What does psychoanalysis do to the brain? In a new Psychotherapy Research paper, Loughead et al. (2010) collected autobiographical relationship narratives from 16 healthy control participants free of any psychiatric or neurological ailments. These types of vignettes were used as stimuli because…

  • Mirror Neurons and Magical EFT Therapy Bears

    27 Jan 2010 | 10:23 pm
    Magic Buttons BearEmotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) is a form of alternative therapy thatpurports to manipulate the body's energy field by tapping on acupuncture points while a specific traumatic memory is focused on, in order to alleviate a psychological problem. Critics have described the theory behind EFT as pseudoscientific and have suggested that any utility stems from its more traditional cognitive components, such as the placebo effect, distraction from negative thoughts, rather than from manipulation of meridians.EFT, a form of Thought Field Therapy (TFT), has been thoroughly…

  • Call for Submissions: 6th Annual Best Visual Illusion of the Year Contest!

    26 Jan 2010 | 11:19 pm
    The contest will be held on May 10th at 5pm Submissions for the 2010 contest are now welcome.Submit your ideas now and take home this prestigious award! Direct queries to: Susana Martinez-Conde(Neural Correlate Society president)For more information, visit the contest website

  • Tonight on the Resting State Network...

    22 Jan 2010 | 12:35 am
    From NeuroImage, via Björn Brembs.

  • This aspirin is dictatorial, prosaic, and selfish

    19 Jan 2010 | 2:43 am
    Fig. 2 (Schaefer & Rotte, 2010 Example of a questionnaire used to form a semantic differential for one particular brand. Subjects had to rate the brands according to their relationships to 18 pairs of contrary adjectives.The nascent field of neuromarketing has grown tremendously in the last 5 years. Its goal is to use brain imaging techniques such as fMRI and EEG to gain hidden insights into consumer preferences. Commercial applications have far outstripped the peer-reviewed science necessary to validate their use. Google returns 322,000 hits for the term neuromarketing, whereas PubMed…
 
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    Brain Stimulant

  • Virtual Whole Body Simulations for Personalized Healthcare

    20 Jan 2010 | 7:21 pm
    The virtual physiological human (VPH) initiative is another project that is related to NeuGrid. Researchers are aiming to develop better computer simulations of the human body. This could potentially allow for personalized medicine, with tailored therapies for each individual.There is a lot of promising biotechnology in the pipeline that has really taken a long time to come to fruition. I think there has been a lot of difficulty in translating the research of stem cells, gene therapy and rna interference into approvable therapies. With pharmaceutical drugs, a lot of the low hanging fruit has…

  • NeuGrid: Brain Imaging Infrastructure for Defeating Neurodegenerative Diseases

    23 Dec 2009 | 4:34 pm
    There is a European project called NeuGrid. The main intent of this undertaking is to improve the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzhiemer's. Neuroscientists are begining to collect a large amount of data from brain scans about specific diseases. Both Henry Markram and Ray Kurzweil have mentioned about certain exponential trends in number crunching and how they can be applied to accelerating progress on these fronts. The information that we are gathering is far too great for any one person to learn even a very tiny fraction of. However new software and technology may be able…

  • Brain Technology

    23 Dec 2009 | 2:18 pm
    A talk about the Blue Brain project has recently been given at the European Future Technologies Conferfence. You can read some more stuff about it at this german site (they have an mp3 audio at that site, but it's in German unfortunately). Blue Brain seeks to simulate the functioning of the brain via a computer. Henry Markram is the main researcher on this project is. Markram is the founder of the Brain Mind Institute (BMI) and he has made some key insights about the functioning of neurons in the past.Currently the researchers have completed the first phase of the project. It sounds like they…

  • Brain Chip to Restore Functioning from Damage

    8 Dec 2009 | 1:51 pm
    The ReNaChip project is developing electronic biomimetic technology that could serve to replace damaged or missing brain tissue. This is basically neuromorphic engineering that seeks to mimic how neurons function. In the future this may be useful for people who have had injuries due to stroke or other illnesses. There are numerous obstacles to getting this tech off the ground. Having the microchip interface properly with the surrounding neural tissue is one issue that could be difficult to circumvent. It is also unclear if some of the models used actually represent specific regions of the…

  • Neurobots: Robots Controlled by Brain Simulations

    10 Nov 2009 | 5:09 am
    Researchers have been developing robots that are powered by better artificial brains. They have recently created a computer neural simulation consisting of 6,700 neurons with approximately 1.3 million synaptic connections. This technology builds on previous work in the field of neurorobotics. The robot they used for this experiment is shown on the left. It is equipped with a CCD video camera. The camera has IR sensors to avoid obstacles and an RF transmitter to process objects visually. The emulation attempts to model aspects of the mind that researchers believe to be important for…
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