Tag: senses

  • Smell… Understand… Know…

    Smell… Understand… Know…

    A pair of researchers has used machine learning to understand what a chemical smells like – a research breakthrough with potential applications in the food flavor and fragrance industries. (1) But how can you understand smell without smelling something? How can you understand anything without knowing it first? Why would you seek knowledge about something…

  • Listen.

    One drone, four microphones and a loudspeaker: nothing more is needed to determine the position of walls and other flat surfaces within a room. This has been mathematically proved by Prof. Gregor Kemper of the Technical University of Munich and Prof. Mireille Boutin of Purdue University in Indiana, USA. (1) The only way to see…

  • Awareness.

    Awareness.

    A research indicates that trees might be ‘aware’ of their size: Scientists found out that birch trees adjust their stem thickness to support their weight. (1) We hold our consciousness so high. Never have we thought to look down to the dirt. Never have we thought that this might be the lowest of the possible…

  • Knowing thy self…

    Knowing thy self…

    Interoception is the awareness of our physiological states; it’s how animals and humans know they’re hungry or thirsty, and how they know when they’ve had enough to eat or drink. But precisely how the brain estimates the state of the body and reacts to it remains unclear. In a paper published in the journal Neuron,…

  • Listen. Without listening…

    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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