Neuroscience

Is the Changing Definition of Autism Narrowing What We Think of as “Normal”?

The definition of autism is getting increasingly broader. As a result, we are building a new reality of the disorder that doesn’t accurately represent the most affected population. I first learned about autism in 1997 in my high school psychology course. It was relegated to a small paragraph in a chapter on childhood disorders. The…

Drinking Coffee Late in the Day Will Screw Up Your Internal Clock

It’s no secret that drinking coffee shortly before bedtime disrupts sleep, but a new study suggests that caffeine can actually affect our body’s internal clock, pushing back our natural rhythms by nearly an hour. I’m an avid coffee drinker and a true believer in the positive effects of caffeine, but I impose a strict personal…

Here’s the Exact Way That the Ice Bucket Challenge Helped ALS Research

Last year’s hugely popular “ice bucket challenge” saw celebrities pouring buckets of ice water over their heads to help fight Lou Gehrig’s Disease (ALS). Skeptics dismissed it as mere “slacktivism,” but researchers told us that the money led directly to a scientific breakthrough. Can slacktivism actually work? Earlier this month, Nicholas Kristof wrote a rather…

The intrepid animators at AsapScience dared to ask Is Masturbation Good For You?Their answer, in their characteristic whiteboard drawing style, covers the positive effects of self-love on brain function, pelvic muscles, and the immune system. Check it out! Contact the author at [email protected].

Will Scientists Ever Solve the Mystery of Consciousness?

We still have no idea how the brain produces conscious awareness. In this excellent short video produced by The Economist, various experts are called upon to explain the “hard problem” that is consciousness, and how scientists might solve this profound mystery. For the video, The Economist gathered together an impressive collection of philosophers and scientists,…

Your Beloved’s Soft Skin Is Just an Illusion

People generally enjoy gently touching and being touched by the people they love. Psychologists at University College London have found that our brains may encourage this behavior by making other people feel softer to us than they really are. In their experiments, published today in the journal Current Biology, 133 volunteers were paired up and…

Consciousness May Be a Lot Like Making Coffee, Say Scientists

We tend to think of losing consciousness as an abrupt shutting down of our awareness of the world, like flicking a light switch. But it’s actually more of a gradual process. The best way to understand it is to brew a cup of coffee. A new theoretical model described in Physical Review Letters suggests that…

This Is Your Brain On Google’s Deep Dream Neural Network

Ever since Google unveiled its Deep Dream algorithm, people have been having a blast feeding all manner of images into theprogram. It was only a matter of time before some enterprising neuroscientist thought to run a couple of brainy MRI images through the software. Juan (“Zeno”) Sanchez-Ramos did just that (above). A neurologist by training,…

Why We Can’t Stop Seeing Aliens on Mars

A crab! A spoon! A crashed UFO! Clearly, the Curiosity Rover is busy excavating the remains of an alien luau, and NASA totally didn’t tell us. The proof is right there! Except not exactly. You see, there a much simpler explanation for those infuriating alien artifacts that keep cropping up on the Red Planet. It’s…

There’s Too Much Gender Variation for Our Brains to (Easily) Deal With 

We think in binaries: plant/animal, day/night, edible/disgusting, safe/dangerous. Breaking the world into discrete chunks helps us make rapid decisions about how to behave, but can also make us uneasy when we’re faced with things that don’t easily fit into one of our mental boxes. In a new article at Nautilus, Stanford neuroendocrinologist Robert Sapolsky explains…

This Surgical Procedure Restores Sensation to the Penis by Remapping the Brain

Guys, imagine for a moment what life would be like if you couldn’t feel your penis. That can happen to men with some kinds of spinal injuries, or who were born with a condition called spina bifida. Their penises can still sense touch, but a break in the spinal cord means the signal never makes…

Sleep Drug Modafinil Affirmed by Scientists as a Safe and Effective Brain Booster

Off-license users of modafinil—a drug developed to treat various sleep disorders—have known for some time that it doubles as a surprisingly effective cognitive enhancer, and with very few side effects. A new systematic review shows it’s true, raising some important ethical questions about the use of smart drugs. Modafinil, which is sold under such brand…

FDA Approves the “Sex Pill For Women”

Yesterday the FDA approved flibanserin, a treatment for premenopausal women who have lost their desire for sex. This was the third time the drug has come up for approval: it was rejected in 2010 and 2013 because the FDA thought its common side effects–particularly fainting and low blood pressure–outweighed its benefits. This time around, Sprout…

Here’s How That New Sex Pill for Women Actually Works

Yesterday, the FDA voted to approve flibanserin, a new drug to treat women with hypoactive sexual desire disorder, or lack of desire for sex. The drug, marketed as Addyi, has been touted as “female Viagra,” in the sense that it helps bring sex back into these women’s lives. But flibanserin doesn’t actually work like Viagra.…

This Mouse Can Be Wirelessly Controlled With LED Light

This is surely a sign that we’re living in the future: Researchers have just invented a remote-controlled LED chip that can make a mouse walk in circles by using light to activate motor neurons in the animal’s brain—or peripheral nerves throughout its body. The device, published this week in Nature Methods, is being hailed a…

If You Could Take a Pill to Improve Your Creativity, Would You?

Sure, who wouldn’t want to be more creative? But what about a pill to improve your self-control, or sociability? What if you enjoy being impulsive, or revel in your alone time? If a pharmacological enhancement changed a defining aspect of your personality, how would it change your perception of that enhancement? Researchers at the National…

You Have Taste Receptors in Your Colon. Here’s Why.

Taste receptors don’t only exist in your mouth. You can find them all over your body, including your stomach, your lungs, and your colon. Why? It turns out the taste receptors are much more versatile tools than we suppose. Some of you might have developed a taste for bitter foods. Those few are probably skinnier…

When You Have an Orgasm for No Reason

Imagine you’re playing a video game, maybe walking somewhere, basically minding your own business when the orgasm arrives. No arousal, no physical stimulation, no buildup, no control: just an instantaneous shift from status quo to woaaah. It’s called an orgasmic seizure. Here’s what scientists are learning from people with this unusual condition. For people with…

Could You Charge an iPhone with the Electricity in Your Brain?

Ever since Morpheus explained how the machines use humans as batteries in The Matrix, we’ve been fascinated by the idea. But can the human body actually generate enough current to do anything useful? We decided to find out, by asking experts how long it would take a human brain to charge an iPhone. Before we…

A New Drug Erases Memories to Treat Addiction

Methamphetamine is one of the nastiest drug addictions to overcome, in part because memories of the high are so powerful. But what if scientists could erase those drug-infused recollections? Researchers at the Scripps Research Institute in Florida have developed a drug that’s able to do just that in mice. The mechanism behind the memory-erasing drug…