brain

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Darwin Skeptics Separate Mind From Gray Matter

Debate focuses on whether the brain and mind function in tandem

(Newser) - To undermine Darwinian theories about the emergence of life, skeptics have a new weapon in mind: the brain, NPR reports. They’re challenging the notion that a cluster of cells could produce such high-level mental processes as consciousness and free will. “It doesn’t hang together,” says one...

Babies Ready to Rock at Birth

Infants can perceive rhythmic regularity

(Newser) - Babies are born ready to get in the groove, a new study suggests. Researchers played repetitive rock beats for infants, and when “metrically-unimportant” aspects of the music were absent, the babies’ auditory activity didn’t change much. But if there was a shift in the rhythm—for instance, if...

Brain Looks Beyond Eyes to Recognize Faces: Scientists

New research shows that eyebrows, noses are key to distinguishing people

(Newser) - Want to make yourself hard to recognize? Get a nose job and shave your eyebrows, say facial-recognition experts, who have yet to fully understand—or agree upon—how we “see” or “read” faces. Psychologists and neuroscientists, fueled by the need to quickly and correctly identify people in the...

Eyes, Brain Make Cards' Fitzgerald Quite the Catch

Star receiver has rare visual skills and a souped-up onboard computer for analysis

(Newser) - More than height, speed, or jumping ability, highly developed eyesight and an extraordinary internal computer make Arizona’s Larry Fitzgerald a top-tier NFL receiver, a scientist tells the Wall Street Journal. Fitzgerald’s optometrist grandfather put him through drills to improve his “visual dominance,” enabling him to take...

Ultrasound May Help Counter Brain Disease

Low frequency ultrasound shown to release neurotransmitters

(Newser) - Bombarding the brain with sound waves may not seem like the most logical way to repair damage, but a new study shows that ultrasound may have therapeutic uses, reports the Economist. While ultrasound technology has long been used to take images of human interiors, such as fetuses in the womb,...

Scientist: Love's Just Brain Chemicals

...that could someday be reproduced in a lab

(Newser) - An American neurologist is determined to prove wrong the poets who say love is beyond understanding, reports the BBC. The Emory professor argues that neurochemical reactions in certain parts of the brain can explain love, raising the possibility that scientists could someday create drugs to bring love back to dying...

It's Your Brain's Fault Your Family Drives You Nuts

(Newser) - If you ended your holiday visit home with frayed nerves, blame your brain, not your brother's snoring, Discovery reports. Family members prompt activity in a different part of the brain from friends and strangers, a new study shows. Researchers used MRIs to look at subjects' brains while they viewed photos...

Baby Born With Extra Foot ... in Brain

Foot, other partly formed appendages may have been from twin that grew within

(Newser) - Surgery to remove a brain tumor from a 3-day-old Colorado boy turned up something “borderline unheard-of,” his doctors say: a foot. When the pediatric neurosurgeon operated Oct. 3 on Sam Esquibel, he saw a small foot, other half-formed appendages, and even intestines in the baby’s head, reports...

Scientists Find 2,000-Year-Old Brain in Britain

Experts ask if head was severed by sacrifice or ritual burial

(Newser) - British archaeologists have unearthed an ancient skull carrying a startling surprise—an unusually well-preserved brain. Scientists said today that the mass of gray matter was more than 2,000 years old, making it the oldest ever discovered in Britain, the AP reports. One expert unconnected with the find called it...

Dementia Patients Often Can't Detect Sarcasm

New tests could help with diagnoses

(Newser) - People suffering from dementia often can't pick up on sarcasm, a finding that could help with diagnoses and in improving patients' relations with caregivers, AFP reports. Australian researchers say patients under age 65 suffering from frontotemporal dementia, the second most common form of the disorder, were unable to detect sarcastic...

Japanese Scientists Can Read Your Mind

They find a way to extract images directly from the brain

(Newser) - The Thought Police could eventually exist in reality, if they can just figure out how to harness new technology developed by Japanese researchers, the Daily Yomuri reports. The team managed to re-create images that people were looking at—using only subjects' recorded brain activity. This is the first successful display...

Researchers Push 'Brain Steroids' for All

Future drugs could boost job, classroom performance

(Newser) - Healthy adults should be able to take brain-boosting drugs for a competitive advantage at work or on an exam, researchers say in a provocative paper. Seven authors say ethical questions about cognitive-enhancement pills are both warranted and imminent, and that such medicinal aid is no less moral than caffeine consumption,...

Science Probes 'Senior Moments'

Researchers discover why an aging brain is prone to distraction

(Newser) - Science has found clues to why older people tend to lose their train of thought so easily: Slower internal brain communications are behind those misplaced names, words, keys, and other “senior moments,” the Wall Street Journal reports. A 200-millisecond difference in an older person’s ability to quickly...

Left-Handed Men Earn More: Study
Left-Handed
Men Earn
More: Study
Nov 29, 2008 4:27 AM CST

Left-Handed Men Earn More: Study

Southpaws struggle in school but surpass righties at work

(Newser) - Left-handed men earn an average of 5% more than right-handed men, two British and Irish studies have discovered. The studies found that southpaw males tended to do worse in school—possibly because of trouble adapting to a right-handed world—but were more successful as adults. Female lefties, however, did worse...

Jacko Needed $350K 'Mind Guru'

Bahraini prince paid consultant to help juice singer's creative process

(Newser) - The sheikh who is suing Michael Jackson says he spent nearly $350,000 on a brain guru for the star, the New York Daily News reports. Mind-mapping and motivational guru Tony Buzan spent one week with the King of Pop in an effort to unlock his creativity, thus allowing him...

Warning Labels Can Be Hazardous to Your Health

Prescription labels, doctor's cues can trigger symptoms

(Newser) - Ignorance truly is bliss when it comes to prescription drugs. The side effects listed on warning labels have a self-fulfilling quality, researchers tell the Wall Street Journal. People sensitive to this "nocebo effect" should think twice before reading that their pills can cause nausea, vomiting, irritability, or difficulty concentrating....

It's a Fine Line Between Love, Hate in the Brain

But hate appears to be a more calculating, rational emotion

(Newser) - Areas of the brain involved in hatred are also activated by love, a study suggests. Researchers took images of brain activity when subjects looked at a photo of someone they despised, ABC News reports. While not identical, the pattern of brain activation those images triggered involved some of the same...

Scientists Wipe Mouse Memories

Treatment selectively erased memories of electric shocks

(Newser) - Scientists have succeeded in blanking selected memories from the brains of mice, Reuters reports. After brain protein levels were manipulated, the mice lost the memory of an electric shock but didn't forget anything else. The researchers said it was doubtful that it would be possible—or desirable—to do the...

Even Moderate Drinking May Shrink Your Brain

Study links alcohol to brain shrinkage

(Newser) - That nightly glass of wine may be good for the heart, but apparently not for the brain. Researchers say that those who imbibe, even in moderate amounts, end up with slightly smaller brains, Health.com reports. The finding surprised scientists, who were seeking evidence that alcohol actually prevented such shrinkage....

Multitasking Can Melt Your Brain

Scientists warn of dangers of doing too much at once

(Newser) - Multitasking isn’t as productive as you may think—in fact, our brains just can’t handle it. Scientists say working on many tasks at once slows all of them down, NPR reports. “No matter how good you have become at multitasking, you’re still going to suffer hits...

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