What’s in a face?
When you meet people for the first time, what’s the first thing you think you notice? Is it their hair color, or eye color? Maybe it’s whether they’re wearing a suit or a T-shirt and jeans, or whether...
View ArticleA face is not a fish
When it comes to recognizing faces, humans are extraordinarily skillful. It’s no surprise — our brains are drawn to faces from the moment we leave the womb, and the average person sees hundreds of...
View ArticleParental controls
It could be that the key to being a better parent is all in your head, Harvard researchers say. In a study in mice, Catherine Dulac, the Higgins Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology and a...
View ArticleA boost for understanding the brain
Two groups of Harvard scientists will be among the first researchers nationwide to receive grant funding through the BRAIN (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies) Initiative...
View ArticleBrown named to National Academy of Engineering
The National Academy of Engineering has elected Emery N. Brown to its ranks, putting him among the few who hold membership in the three major U.S. scientific academies. Brown, the Warren Zapol...
View ArticlePromising stem cell therapy
Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have developed an “imageable” mouse model of brain-metastatic breast cancer and shown the potential of a stem...
View ArticleInjectable device delivers nano-view of the brain
It’s a notion that might have come from the pages of a science-fiction novel — an electronic device that can be injected directly into the brain, or other body parts, and treat everything from...
View ArticleTwo named MacArthur Fellows
Matthew Desmond, the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences, and Beth Stevens, an assistant professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and neuroscientist at Boston...
View ArticleHow the brain builds new thoughts
Let’s start with a simple sentence: Last week Joe Biden beat Vladimir Putin in a game of Scrabble. It’s a strange notion to entertain, certainly, but one humans can easily make sense of, researchers...
View ArticleWatching sensory information translate into behavior
It remains one of the most fundamental questions in neuroscience: How does the flood of sensory information — everything an animal touches, tastes, smells, sees, and hears — translate into behavior? A...
View ArticleEye-opening complexity
Crack open just about any biology textbook to read up on the thalamus, and you’ll find that its function is mainly to serve as a relay station, handing off sensory input to the cerebral cortex for...
View ArticleAuditory cortex nearly identical in hearing and deaf people
The neural architecture in the auditory cortex — the part of the brain that processes sound — is virtually identical in profoundly deaf and hearing people, a new study has found. The study raises a...
View ArticleHow the brain develops
The developmental period from childhood to young adulthood is marked by profound physical, social, and emotional changes. But exactly how those changes are reflected in the brain remains something of...
View ArticleSpotting speedy brain activity
Researchers have long understood that functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is a powerful tool for understanding both brain structure and activity, but new research suggests it is a good deal...
View ArticleNew vistas opening for brain disorder research
In a culture flask, 45 lentil-sized globs of neurons swirl in a gentle eddy of liquid medium. These lumpy, 3-D networks of human nerve cells, called brain organoids, have generated more diverse and...
View ArticleHarvard professor talks brain engineering at Ed Portal
The brain and how it learns may be among the most complicated puzzles in the quickly advancing field of neuroscience. But Harvard is trying to unravel its mystery. The Ariadne Project, led by David...
View ArticleHand-tool connection is innate despite lack of limbs
Scientists have long known that the brain’s visual system shows considerable organization. Tests have repeatedly found that different parts of the brain are activated when people see different...
View ArticleWhole brain insights in Harvard findings
Scientists appear closer than ever to unlocking the black box that is the brain, and they’re doing it with the help of a fish less than half an inch long. Led by Jeff Lichtman, the Jeremy R. Knowles...
View ArticleUsing fMRI, EEG to search for consciousness in ICU patients
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and electroencephalography (EEG) may be able to identify ICU patients with severe traumatic brain injuries who have a level of consciousness not revealed...
View ArticleBrain flexibility changes the way we remember and learn
The human brain has a region of cells responsible for linking sensory cues to actions and behaviors and cataloging the link as a memory. Cells that form these links have been deemed highly stable and...
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