Category: Senses
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Listen. Without listening…
Brain activity synchronizes with sound waves, even without audible sound, through lip-reading, according to new research published in JNeurosci. Bourguignon et al. used magnetoencephalography to measure brain activity in healthy adults while they listened to a story or watched a silent video of a woman speaking. The participants' auditory cortices synchronized with sound waves produced…
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Drawing. Seeing.
Drawing an object and naming it engages the brain in similar ways, according to research recently published in JNeurosci. The finding demonstrates the importance of the visual processing system for producing drawings of an object. In a study by Fan et al., healthy adults performed two tasks while the researchers recorded brain activity using functional…
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Flowers.
When flowers reached Australia: University of Melbourne research has established when and where flowering plants first took a foothold. New research has revealed that Australia's oldest flowering plants are 126 million years old and may have resembled modern magnolias, buttercups and laurels. (1) An empty continent. With no flowers. Full with life. But void of…
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Growing in darkness…
New research reveals how a week in the dark rewires brain cell networks and changes hearing sensitivity in adult mice long after the optimal window for auditory learning has passed. With further study, cross-modal learning -- the manipulation of one sense to induce change in another sense -- could be used to help people with…
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Not seeing the tree…
Researchers have shown how it is possible that objects stand out less when they are surrounded by similar objects. This surroundings-suppressing effect is caused by feedback from higher visual brain areas. The results of this research are important for a better understanding of the way in which the brain transforms incoming light into a cohesive…
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