Brain Sense

How your brain makes sense of your senses.

by Faith Brynie

Mindfulness for a Mindless Age

A new book on mindfulness says experiencing life as it comes can go a long way toward relieving pain, stress, and anxiety. I once wrote a science fiction story that illustrates the point. Read More

"Best Visual Illusion of the Year" Contest

Today's "Best Illusion of the Year" competition will welcome over a thousand vision scientists and visual artists. They'll celebrate how the brain's visual-perception system creates something that isn't there. Read More

Life Lessons from Teenage "Brains" of the 1960s

The first Presidential Scholars, who received their award from Lyndon Johnson, are now bouncing their grandchildren on their arthritic knees and filing for their Social Security. They are also asking themselves, What lessons has life taught me? Educational researchers Felice Kaufmann and Dona Matthews asked them that same question. Read More

The Molecular Architecture of Memory

A new model shows how the size, shape, and electrical attractions of an enzyme known to be important in memory formation perfectly matches the "skeletal framework" of nerve cells—the microtubules.This mechanism may help explain how memory proteins are formed and stored in the brain. Read More

Nearly Two-Thirds of Children With ASD Have Been Bullied

The results of a survey on bullying among children with autism spectrum disorders will help guide policies and improvements in education, social services, and medical care. Read More

Brain Architecture and Williams Syndrome

Brain mapping studies of rare syndromes can help us understand how genes affect both anatomy and behavior. Read More

Can Brain Imaging Predict Who Will Suffer Cognitive Impairment?

Early detection of brain changes in the elderly may lead to better treatments—even prevention—of disorders like Alzheimer's disease. Read More

The Placebo Effect: How It Works

The placebo effect is not deception, fluke, experimenter bias, or statistical anomaly. It is, instead, a product of expectation. The human brain anticipates outcomes, and anticipation produces those outcomes. Read More

Beautiful Music: It's All in the Brain

Do old violins produce the best sound? French researchers put Stradivari to the test. Read More

What Nematodes and Sea Slugs Tell Us about Our Brains

One way to study the human brain is to look at the brains of other animals. Nematodes and sea slugs can tell us a lot about how our senses work and how we learn. What we discover has many practical applications--from smoking cessation to the treatment of learning impairments. Read More

The Solid Science of Autism

Autism spectrum disorder has attracted intense interest from the public and scientists over recent years. A new web page from Nature sorts fact from fiction with a collection of news and comment articles. Read More

Do the Holidays Give You the Hiccups?

If too much holiday merriment is giving you the hiccups, you're not alone. Everyone gets the hiccups from time to time, but in exceedingly rare cases, a brain abnormality may induce hiccups that last for months, even years. Read More

Why Do You Yawn When You're Not Sleepy?

Do brains, like computers, operate best when they're cool? Some evidence suggests that yawning may help regulate brain temperature and protect against overheating, Read More

Is Light Keeping You Awake?

A lot of people question why they cannot sleep, but for neuroscientists, the more intriguing question may be why we ever wake up. Read More

Put Your Cell Phone in Your Sock Drawer, Part III

Because children's heads, brains, and bones absorb more radiation from cell phones than adult models predict, some experts suggest that new methods of measuring and monitoring are long overdue. Read More

A National Survey on Bullying and Autism Spectrum Disorders

Bullying, a pervasive problem among youth, has attracted the national spotlight in recent months because of the lasting, and sometimes tragic, effects on children and teenagers across the country. Children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are believed to be especially vulnerable Read More

Diagnosing Autism in Children with Down Syndrome

Data from a 16-year study confirm that standard methods can be used to identify autism spectrum disorders (ASD) in children with Down syndrome. Read More

You Brain Works Like a Radio

This week, UCLA neurophysicists report that there is an optimal brain "rhythm," or frequency, for changing synaptic strength. And further, like stations on a radio dial, each synapse is tuned to a different optimal frequency for learning. Read More

Is Your Brain Like a Radio?

Ask a scientist what memory is, and you'll probably get long-term potentiation (LTP) as an answer. Read More

Online Course Explores the Teenage Brain

This fall, Barbara Strauch, health and medicine editor for The New York Times, will teach an online course entitled "Exploring the Teenage Brain." Read More

Understanding the Middle-Aged Brain

A live Webcast features New York Times health and medicine editor Barbara Strauch, whose recent book, The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain, has struck a chord with adults everywhere who worry about their mental capacity. Read More

A Little Known Eating Disorder Is on the Rise

Pica is eating something that is not food. Read More

Can We Bully-proof Our Kids? Maybe, If We Can Help Them Manage Their Social Goals

Children with positive social goals handle bullies better. Read More

Why Ice Cream Chases the Blues Away

A new brain imaging study reveals what emotional eaters have always known: fatty foods are as good at beating the blues as any antidepressant. Read More

Does Meditation Change the Brain? Can It Slow Aging?

New research suggests that meditation changes the brain...or maybe meditators' brains are just different to begin with. Might meditation slow the aging process? It's possible. Read More

Air Pollution Is Bad for Your Brain

New research from Ohio State University suggests that air pollution may cause learning and memory problems--even depression! Read More

BioBolt: The Next Generation of Brain-Machine Interfaces

Someday a brain-computer interface like the University of Michigan's BioBolt may allow a paralyzed person to move just by thinking about moving. Read More

Music Lessons: They're Not Just for Kids Anymore

Learning and playing music are good for the brain at any age. Musical training and performance improve working memory, perceptual speed, motor skills, hearing abilities, and auditory memory. Read More

Social Defeat Changes Young Brains

In experiments with mice, "social defeat" changes brain chemistry. Does the same thing happen in people? Read More

Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones . . . But Words Will Cut Me Deeply

Verbal abuse can leave deep psychological scars, but teens need not suffer in silence. Read More

Faith Brynie, Ph.D, is a scientific and medical writer. She is the author of Brain Sense (Amacom, 2009).

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About Brain Sense

Have you ever wondered why you remember color images and scenes so much better than those in black and white? Why certain odors evoke vivid memories? The answers to those questions and many more lie in the way our brains interpret and process the sights, smells, tastes, and touches that make up our lives. In my book Brain Sense I explore brain function and the senses. I write on that same topic in my Brain Sense blog.