Next time your brain plays tricks on you, you have an excuse: according to new research by UCL scientists published today in the journal Nature, the brain is intrinsically unreliable.
This may not seem surprising to most of us, but it has puzzled neuroscientists for decades. Given that the brain is the most powerful computing device known, how can it perform so well even though the behaviour of its circuits is variable?
A new University of British Columbia study says that an overreliance on research subjects from the U.S. and other Western nations can produce false claims about human psychology and behavior because their psychological tendencies are highly unusual compared to the global population.
For the first time, scientists have linked a brain compound called kynurenic acid to cognition, possibly opening doors for new ways to enhance memory function and treat catastrophic brain diseases, according to a new study from the University of Maryland School of Medicine. When researchers decreased the levels of kynurenic acid in the brains of mice, their cognition was shown to improve markedly, according to the study, which was published in the July issue of the journal Neuropsychopharmacology.
It's a common scenario: you're on a diet, determined to give up eating cakes, but as you pass the cake counter, all resolve disappears… Now, scientists at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging at UCL (University College London) have shed light on the brain processes that affect our will power and make us act impulsively.
Researchers from the University of Auckland, New Zealand, have discovered that a potent new drug restores hearing after noise-induced hearing loss in rats. The landmark discovery found that injection of an agent called 'ADAC', activates adenosine receptors in cochlear tissues, resulting in recovery of hearing function. The finding paves the way for effective non-surgical therapies to restore hearing loss after noise-induced injury. Dr. Srdjan Vlajkovic and his team's work[1] is published in a special edition of Springer's journal Purinergic Signalling, focusing on the inner ear.
The defining feature of social insects is that societies contain queens, which specialise in laying eggs, as well as workers, which are mostly infertile but take care of the offspring and the nest. However, when the queen dies or is re-moved, workers begin laying eggs of their own. Previous observations have suggested that queens possess a specific pheromone which keeps the workers infer-tile, but the pheromone has never been identified except in the well-studied honeybee. Queen pheromones have a lot to tell us about how sociality evolved.
Women who are physically active at any point over the life course (teenage, age 30, age 50, late life) have lower risk of cognitive impairment in late-life compared to those who are inactive, but teenage physical activity appears to be most important. This is the key finding of a study of over nine thousand women published today in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
Predator scent enhanced the ability of pond snails (Lymnaea stagnalis) to form memory following training, whilst overcrowding and reduced calcium had a blocking effect.
"Understanding when stress blocks or enhances memory in a simple animal model may help elucidate the mechanisms in more complex animals such as humans", explained Dr Sarah Dalesman.
New York University researchers have identified a mechanism the brain uses to help process sound localization. Their findings, which appear in the latest edition of the journal PLoS Biology, focus on how the brain computes the different arrival times of sound into each ear to estimate the location of its source.
Animals can locate the source of a sound by detecting microsecond (one millionth of a second) differences in arrival time at their two ears. New York University researchers have identified a mechanism the brain uses to help process sound localization. This group of scientists found that one reason these neurons are able to perform such a rapid and sensitive computation is because they are extremely responsive to the input's "rise time"—the time it takes to reach the peak of the synaptic input. The findings will publish next week in the online, open access journal PLoS Biology.
It's a common scenario: you're on a diet, determined to give up eating cakes, but as you pass the cake counter, all resolve disappears… Now, scientists at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging at UCL (University College London) have shed light on the brain processes that affect our will power and make us act impulsively.
Washington, DC — In the initial stages of sleep, energy levels increase dramatically in brain regions found to be active during waking hours, according to new research in the June 30 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience. These results suggest that a surge of cellular energy may replenish brain processes needed to function normally while awake.
Motivation doesn't have to be conscious; your brain can decide how much it wants something without input from your conscious mind. Now a new study shows that both halves of your brain don't even have to agree. Motivation can happen in one side of the brain at a time.
