Unusually Wired: Human Brains are Attuned to Appreciate Musical Pitch

Elevated levels of a neurotoxin in northeastern Brazil’s drinking water and a high incidence of microcephaly in the region led scientists to look for a link, and they found one.

When 70 independent teams were tasked with analyzing identical brain images, no two teams chose the same approach and their conclusions were highly variable.

Affectionate touches tap into the nervous system’s rest and digest mode, reducing the release of stress hormones, bolstering the immune system, and stimulating brainwaves linked with relaxation.

Two studies show that Plasmodium—the genus of protozoans that cause malaria—have an internal sense of time that synchronizes with their host’s circadian rhythms and allows the parasites to collectively attack blood cells.

A new study in mice does not find evidence supporting two popular ideas for the mechanism for bridging the temporal time gap between two paired stimuli.

The gene, aquaporin-4, is critical in rodents for the cerebrospinal fluid bath the brain gets during sleep. It’s now also tied to slow wave electrical activity during deep sleep in people.

In Chapter 10, “Memory," author Matthew Cobb takes readers inside a couple of seminal moments in the scientific search for memory’s mechanics.

How will humanity record the unprecedented predicament we find ourselves in?