In Down syndrome mice, 40Hz light and sound improve cognition, neurogenesis, connectivity
New evidence suggests sensory stimulation of gamma-frequency brain rhythm may promote broad-based restorative neurological health response.
Dopamine signals when a fear can be forgotten
Study shows how a dopamine circuit enables mice to extinguish fear after a peril has passed, opening new avenues for understanding and potentially treating fear-related disorders.
TeleAbsence: Poetic encounters with the past
MIT researchers lay out design principles behind the TeleAbsence vision, how it could help people cope with loss and plan for how they might be remembered.
A new way to bring personal items to mixed reality
“InteRecon” enables users to capture items in a mobile app and reconstruct their interactive features in mixed reality. The tool could assist in education, medical environments, museums, and more.
Evidence that 40Hz gamma stimulation promotes brain health is expanding
A decade of studies provide a growing evidence base that increasing the power of the brain’s gamma rhythms could help fight Alzheimer’s, and perhaps other neurological diseases.
Study: Even after learning the right idea, humans and animals still seem to test other approaches
New research adds evidence that learning a successful strategy for approaching a task doesn’t prevent further exploration, even if doing so reduces performance.
Study suggests how the brain, with sleep, learns meaningful maps of spaces
Place cells are known to encode individual locations, but research finds stitching together a “cognitive map” of a whole environment requires a broader ensemble of cells, aided by sleep, over several days.
Weaving memory into textiles
For the MIT Visiting Artist Chloé Bensahel, fabric itself tells the story.
To understand cognition — and its dysfunction — neuroscientists must learn its rhythms
A new framework describes how thought arises from the coordination of neural activity driven by oscillating electric fields — a.k.a. brain “waves” or “rhythms.”
How sensory gamma rhythm stimulation clears amyloid in Alzheimer’s mice
Study finds stimulating a key brain rhythm with light and sound increases peptide release from interneurons, driving clearance of an Alzheimer’s protein.
Study advances understanding of visual recognition memory
Scientists have invested decades in piecing together how our vision is so good at recognizing what’s familiar. A new study overcomes an apparent discrepancy in data to reveal a new insight into how it works.
Re-imagining our theories of language
Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences faculty members Ev Fedorenko, Ted Gibson, and Roger Levy believe they can answer a fundamental question: What is the purpose of language?
Canceling noise to improve quantum devices
MIT researchers develop a protocol to extend the life of quantum coherence.
Molecule reduces inflammation in Alzheimer’s models
A potential new Alzheimer’s drug represses the harmful inflammatory response of the brain’s immune cells, reducing disease pathology, preserving neurons, and improving cognition in preclinical tests.
Brain networks encoding memory come together via electric fields, study finds
Electric fields shared among neurons via “ephaptic coupling” provide the coordination necessary to assemble the engrams that represent remembered information.