Brain and cognitive sciences

Neel V. Patel writes for Popular Science about the online game Eyewire developed by MIT researchers. The game has allowed neuroscientists to gather data that is helping them to map the eye’s neural network.

In a piece for Scientific American about the advantages of dyslexia, Matthew H. Schneps highlights an MIT study that found that people with dyslexia “can distribute their attention far more broadly than do typical readers,” and often have heightened visual and auditory senses. 

Lenny Bernstein of The Washington Post writes about a new study conducted by researchers from MIT and Johns Hopkins University that showed that sightless people, “understand how others see the world in the same way that sighted people do — though they have never personally experienced a single visual image.”

Nathalia Holt writes for Popular Science about Professor Feng Zhang’s work with gene-editing systems, in particular TALENs and CRISPR, and how these new techniques could be used to help tackle deadly diseases. 

In a piece for Wired, Robert McMillan examines new MIT research showing that computers “powered by the latest ‘deep learning’ algorithms,” are catching up in tests that compare their intelligence to those of monkeys. 

Rachel Zimmerman of WBUR reports on how neuroscientists have located a neural pathway that could transform how dyslexia is addressed. “In preliminary findings, researchers report that brain measures taken in kindergartners — even before the kids can read — can “significantly” improve predictions of how well, or poorly, the children can master reading later on,” Zimmerman reports. 

Lauren Hitchings reports for New Scientist on findings from Professor Earl Miller that show how the the synchronization of brain waves across different regions of the brain may explain our brain’s ability to rapidly process and interpret information. 

Carey Goldberg of WBUR features Prof. Ed Boyden’s optogenetics research in a segment on neuroscience advances. “We might be in a golden age of making such tools because most fields of engineering had not been applied to the brain, so there’s just a gold rush of possibility,” says Boyden.

In this compilation of WBUR videos, 11 neuroscientists from MIT, Harvard, and Boston University discuss their current research and the importance of their work. The videos feature five researchers from MIT: Ben Bartelle, Claire O’Connell, Anna Beyeler, Emily Mackevicius, and Neville Sanjana.

MIT scientists have compared the brain activity of adults who had ADHD as children and adults who still have the disorder, reports Melissa Malamut in Boston Magazine. Researchers uncovered, “key differences in a brain communication network that is active when the brain is at wakeful rest and not focused on a particular task,” Malamut writes. 

Los Angeles Times reporter Amina Khan features new MIT research examining a child’s ability to decipher when adults are committing “sins of omission.” Researchers found that, “kids can tell when someone isn’t giving them the whole story – and they learn not to trust the information that person gives them,” Khan reports.

Boston Globe reporter Carolyn Johnson writes about how Boston researchers are building brain implants aimed at treating mental illnesses suffered by combat veterans.  

In this New York Times video, Zach Wise reports on EyeWire, the citizen neuroscience game developed by MIT researchers to map the human brain. “In order to look at the structures of neurons, we have to analyze images, a lot of images. Those images can’t be analyzed completely automatically by computers; we actually need human intelligence,” Sebastian Seung explains. 

New York Times reporter James Gorman explains how EyeWire, the citizen science game developed at MIT to map the human brain, works. “Anyone can sign up online, learn to use the software and start working on what Amy Robinson, the creative director of Eyewire, calls a ‘3-D coloring book,’” Gorman writes.

James Gorman features the work of former MIT Professor Sebastian Seung. Gorman highlights Seung’s work with the citizen science game EyeWire at MIT.