Birdsong Stirs Birds’ ‘Emotions’ Much As Music Affects Humans, Brain Imaging Study Suggests

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Birds can sing. They can dance. And they may even experience an emotional response to music similar to humans.

A new study from Emory University in Atlanta found that when birds hear birdsong, their brains show activity similar to that seen in humans when they listen to music.

“We found that the same neural reward system is activated in female birds in the breeding state that are listening to male birdsong, and in people listening to music that they like,” Sarah Earp, an Emory undergraduate who co-authored the study with neuroscientist Dr. Donna Maney, said in a written statement.

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A Bengalese finch outfitted with headphones. Research on how the birds learn to sing may lead to better human therapies for vocal rehabilitation.

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Brain Cell Life Span Finding In Mice Seen As Good News For Life Extension Enthusiasts

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Brain cells can live at least twice as long as the organisms in which they reside, according to new research.

The study, published today (Feb. 25) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that mouse neurons, or brain cells, implanted into rats can survive with the rats into old age, twice as long as the life span of the original mice.

The findings are good news for life extension enthusiasts.

“We are slowly but continuously prolonging the life of humans,” said study co-author Dr. Lorenzo Magrassi, a neurosurgeon at the University of Pavia in Italy.

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Mouse neurons implanted into a rat brain can live twice as long as the mice from which they were taken, new research suggests.

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New Facts and Old Habits: How Your Brain Sculpts Your Memories

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Like many large companies, MusclePharm has seen its share of both positive and negative press. Over the past two years the nutritional supplements manufacturer has battled lawsuits alleging price discrimination, environmental violations and patent infringement — all while bringing home boatloads of best-product awards and celebrity athlete endorsements. In short, it’s a company whose popularity has so far managed to drown out the cries of naysayers.

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‘Sesame Street’ Study Uses Brain Scans To Show Program’s Effect On Nerve Cells In Children, Adults

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Children are not the only ones who can learn from Big Bird and brain scans of children and adults watching “Sesame Street” reveal how brains change as they learn reading and math, researchers say.

One goal of brain imaging is discovering more about how children learn. Such an understanding of the building blocks of learning might help diagnose and treat learning difficulties.

For instance, “when children fail to learn mathematics well, there could be a number of different reasons for that and it could be that they have weak concepts of numbers, that they have poor memory, that they have limited attention,” researcher Jessica Cantlon, a cognitive neuroscientist at the University of Rochester in New York, told LiveScience. Brain tests could help determine the precise cause of a kid’s math impairments, “because different patterns of brain activity likely accompany each of those different cognitive impairments.”

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Neuroscience And Art: Margaret Livingstone Explains How Artists Take Advantage Of Human Visual Processing (VIDEO)

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The Mona Lisa is arguably the most famous painting in the world. Have you ever wondered why? Leonardo Da Vinci was masterful at manipulating our own visual shortcomings to make us feel something beautiful, complicated, even unsettling. There’s just something about her smile.

Dr. Margaret Livingstone, a visual neurophysiologist at Harvard, knows this all too well. I recently spoke with her about how our visual systems have evolved to process one of the inventions that sets us apart from non-human animals–art.

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Chimp Brain Study Spotlights Key Role Of Neural ‘Connectivity’ In Human Intelligence

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Despite sharing 98 percent of our DNA with chimpanzees, humans have much bigger brains and are, as a species, much more intelligent. Now a new study sheds light on why: Unlike chimps, humans undergo a massive explosion in white matter growth, or the connections between brain cells, in the first two years of life.

The new results, published today (Dec. 18) in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, partly explain why humans are so much brainier than our nearest living relatives. But they also reveal why the first two years of life play such a key role in human development.

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Unlike human brains, those of chimpanzees don’t go through a rapid explosion in neural connectivity during the first two years of life, which may explain humans’ superior intelligence.

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Fetuses Yawn In ’4D’ Scans Of Womb, Spotlighting Brain Development (VIDEO)

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LONDON (Reuters) – Growing into a fully formed human being is a long process, and scientists have found that unborn babies not only hiccup, swallow and stretch in the womb, they yawn too.

Researchers who studied 4D scans of 15 healthy fetuses also said they think yawning is a developmental process which could potentially give doctors a new way to check on a baby’s health.

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Albert Einstein’s Brain May Provide Clues To His Genius, Study Says

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Called the “embodiment of pure intellect,” Albert Einstein has long been considered one of the most brilliant men who ever lived. During his life and since his death, people everywhere have wondered how one man could have possessed such genius.

Now, scientists may have uncovered a clue within the physicist’s unusual brain.

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Genes Tied To IQ, Brain Size In UCLA ENIGMA Study

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Brain size and smarts are, to some extent, genetic — and now, a team of more than 200 researchers has uncovered specific genes that are linked to both brain volume and IQ.

Though scientists have suggested bigger brains are “smarter,” this study is the strongest case yet for a genetic connection to brain size and to IQ. Of course, brain size is not 100 percent correlated with a person’s intelligence, and other factors, including connections between brain cells and even a person’s experiences, play roles.

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Internet Brain: How Does Online World Affect Your Thinking? (VIDEO)

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Is the internet bad for our brains? Is it affecting our ability to remember things, form meaningful relationships, or make decisions? How is it beneficial? Isn’t having so much information at our fingertips a good thing?

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