Scientists Engineer Dreams to Understand the Sleeping Brain

Technologies such as noninvasive brain stimulation and virtual reality gaming offer insights into how dreams arise and what functions they might serve.

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ABOVE: © TIFFANY DANG

Adam Haar Horowitz is the first to admit that whispering to strangers as they fall asleep “seems a little creepy.” He’d been mulling over the idea with fellow MIT master’s student Ishaan Grover a few years ago while thinking about ways to influence the dreamlike visions people see at sleep onset, a state known as hypnagogia. The pair wondered if quietly saying words or phrases to people in hypnagogia might influence the content of their thoughts and visions, thereby serving both as a tool to investigate human cognition and, ultimately, as a means to help people wield control over their dreaming brains.

Haar Horowitz didn’t end up whispering into strangers’ ears, but he, Grover, and other collaborators did find a way to execute the basic concept, using a more practical solution: a device that fits into a person’s hand to monitor changes in heart rate, muscle ...

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Meet the Author

  • Catherine Offord

    Catherine is a science journalist based in Barcelona.

Published In

December 2020

Dream Engineers

Manipulating the sleeping brain to understand it

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