Going to space is harsh on the human body, and as a new study from our research team finds, the brain shifts upward and backward and deforms inside the skull after spaceflight. The extent of these changes was greater for those who spent longer in space. As NASA plans longer space missions, and space travel … Read more
Scientists have identified a “dial” in the human brain that ramps up when we explore a new area — and the finding could help us understand why getting lost is often an early symptom of dementia, such as Alzheimer’s disease. Imagine you’re walking a well-worn route home, but you accidentally take a wrong turn. It … Read more
You may assume that children have nightmares about monsters under the bed, while adults dream about stressful events like deadlines. But is there any scientific evidence showing that dreams change as we age? Although there are plausible mechanisms for how aging could cause dreams to change over time, very little research has explored the topic. … Read more
Scientists may be closer to understanding why time seems to pass more quickly as we age — and brain scans of people watching an old Alfred Hitchcock show helped them address this enduring question. In a study published Sept. 30 in the journal Communications Biology, scientists pulled data from the Cambridge Centre for Ageing and … Read more
Half-forgotten memories can be resurrected using “mental time travel,” a new study suggests. The research, published Monday (July 28) in the journal PNAS, showed that a person can rejuvenate their fading memories by recalling the emotions and thoughts they had when they first stored that memory. In fact, the researchers found that the refurbished memories … Read more
Memories of places “drift” across the brain as they are carried by different sets of neurons over time, a new study in mice suggests. Historically, neuroscientists thought that memories of locations and features of our immediate environment were encoded by specific “place cells.” These place cells, located in a key memory center called the hippocampus, … Read more
You can use up all the storage on your phone or max out your computer’s drive, but can you use up all the memory space in your brain? Despite how you might feel before an exam or after a sleepless night before a work deadline, neuroscientists say that for a typical, healthy brain, memory capacity … Read more
Scientists have made new improvements to a “brain decoder” that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to convert thoughts into text. Their new converter algorithm can quickly train an existing decoder on another person’s brain, the team reported in a new study. The findings could one day support people with aphasia, a brain disorder that affects a … Read more
Forgetting is part of our daily lives. You may walk into a room only to forget why you went in there — or perhaps someone says hi on the street and you can’t remember their name. But why do we forget things? Is it simply a sign of memory impairment, or are there benefits? One … Read more
Brain organoids are 3D, lab-grown models designed to mimic the human brain. Scientists normally grow them from stem cells, coaxing them into forming a brain-like structure. In the past decade, they have become increasingly sophisticated and can now replicate multiple types of brain cells, which can communicate with one another. This has led some scientists … Read more
