Researchers have provide new evidence that the human brain lives "on the edge of chaos," at a critical transition point between randomness and order. The study provides experimental data on an idea previously fraught with theoretical speculation.
The Brain Maintains Language Skills In Spite Of Alcohol Damage By Drawing From Other Regions Researchers know that alcoholism can damage the brain's frontal lobes and cerebellum, regions involved in language processing. Nonetheless, alcoholics' language skills appear to be relatively spared from alcohol's damaging effects. New findings suggest the brain maintains language skills by drawing upon other systems that would normally be used to perform other tasks simultaneously.
The Brain 'Joins The Dots' When Drawing A Cartoon Face From Memory Scientists used a brain scanner to record the brain's activity in each stage of the process of drawing faces. The researchers found that the captured visual information is stored as a series of locations or action plans to reach those locations. It is as if the brain remembers key locations and then "joins the dots" with a straight or curved line to achieve the desired image on the page.
Human Brain Can Recognize Objects Much Faster Than Some Have Thought Some experts believe that vision isn't possible without feedback from higher levels of the brain, but a study now demonstrates that the brain can rapidly recognize objects under a variety of conditions at a very early processing stage. The study involved patients with epilepsy who were undergoing high-resolution brain mapping prior to neurosurgery.
Gene Predicts How Brain Responds To Fatigue, Human Study Shows New imaging research helps explain why sleep deprivation affects some people more than others. After staying awake all night, those who are genetically vulnerable to sleep loss showed reduced brain activity, while those who are genetically resilient showed expanded brain activity, the study found. The findings help explain individual differences in the ability to compensate for lack of sleep.
The Fancier The Cortex, The Smarter The Brain? Why are some people smarter than others? A new article describes how certain aspects of brain structure and function help determine how easily we learn new things, and how learning capacity contributes to individual differences in intelligence.
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