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Tsai presents non-invasive stimulation study at Massachusetts Down Syndrome Congress

March 27, 2024

… benefits. With early studies indicating that non-invasive sensory stimulation of a gamma frequency brain rhythm may … band frequency of the brain associated with processing sensory information and also memory and cognition. Finding a … health-promoting changes in brain cells including neurons, astrocytes and the brain’s vasculature. One of the …

A noninvasive treatment for “chemo brain”

March 06, 2024

… to the chemotherapy drug cisplatin. Mice treated with 40Hz sensory stimulation (right) showed much less DNA damage than mice that did not receive 40Hz sensory stimulation (left). Tsai, who also leads MIT's Aging … loss of myelin, the protective fatty coating that allows neurons to propagate electrical signals. Many of these …

As brain extracts meaning from vision, study tracks progression of processing

July 10, 2018

… A new study that tracked how the brain turns simple sensory inputs, such as “green,” into meaningful categories, … of six cortical regions operated along a continuum between sensory processing and categorization. To be sure, general … were eavesdropping on the activity of hundreds of neurons in six regions across the cortex: prefrontal (PFC), …

Circuit that focuses attention brings in wide array of inputs

April 21, 2022

… brain incorporates and integrates information to focus its sensory resources on its goals. Working in mice, the team … smaller and less evolved than the pulvinar. ACC-projecting neurons visible in the LP region of a mouse brain “In these … information as well. “We’re seeing that it’s not just sensory—there are so many inputs that are coming from …

New autism research projects represent a broad range of approaches to achieving a shared goal

November 21, 2024

… autistic brain. From studies of the connections between neurons, to interactions between the nervous and immune … project that focuses on another phenomenon: the feeling of sensory overload that many autistic people experience. … shown that the brain’s ability to make predictions about sensory stimuli, which is critical to filtering out mundane …

An elegant behavior switching circuit

… states (such as hunger) and external cues (such as sensory cues indicating the availability of food). Research … or serotonin). In 2019, the lab revealed how internal sensory information triggers the release of serotonin to … But if food is smelled and no eating is happening, other neurons inhibit NSM with PDF, allowing roaming toward the …

40Hz rhythms fight Alzheimer’s at the cellular and molecular level

… light and sound together was especially powerful. Above: Sensory exposure to 40Hz light prevented neurodegeneration in … Alzheimer's mouse brain is on the left. One treated with sensory stimulation is on the right. Importantly the MIT team … reflected in substantial changes in gene expression in neurons and microglia that the team measured in mice exposed …

Brain waves and cognition

… largely dismissed the coordinated rhythmic activity of neurons as a byproduct of the brain’s operation, rather than … a seminal study in his lab demonstrated that “bottom up” sensory signals (e.g. “the eyes see a triangle”) are … beta rhythms increases as regions move from more basically sensory (v4)to more cognitively sophisticated (PFC). The …

Symposium spotlights crucial roles of dendrites

October 18, 2021

… dendrites flamboyantly flail forth from the bodies of neurons, showing off their complex beauty. At the Picower … function Indeed dendrites enable brain functions such as sensory perception and how we make sense of it. In his … method to observe neural activity associated with expected sensory stimuli. Professor Fritjof Helmchen of the University …

Young Picower scientists present projects at ‘SfN’

November 12, 2021

… over the course of training, with periods of sleep, more neurons become involved in representing spatial contexts, … remains dynamic enough on one hand to account for new sensory input but stable enough to still produce the reliable … Adam Eisen show how anesthetic drugs might shut down sensory input by making the brain so stable as to be …