( Duke University)

The old proverb, “two heads are better than one,” was put to the test recently when researchers electronically linked the brains of two rats, prompting the animals to work together to accomplish a common goal.

The researchers fitted each rat with a device that allowed one rat to send brain waves to the other, even when separated by long distances.  The rat that received the transmitted information used it to help perform a simple task, which earned both rats a reward.

When the rats’ joint efforts were unsuccessful, the animals used the device as a two-way communicator, to mentally collaborate with each other until they performed the task properly.

“These experiments demonstrated the ability to establish a sophisticated, direct communication linkage between rat brains, and that the decoder brain is working as a pattern-recognition device,” said Miguel Nicolelis from Duke University’s School of Medicine. “So basically, we are creating an organic computer that solves a puzzle.”

Microscopic electrodes were inserted into the brains of the two lab rats, into an area of the cerebral cortex which processes motor information, forming what researchers called an “organic computer.”

One of the rats, considered to be the encoder, transmitted brain wave information to the other rat, known as the decoder.

Screen capture of a video showing the encoder rat (left) transmitting brain waves to the decoder rat (right), which is receiving the information via an electronic device (Duke University)

The encoder rat received a visual cue, such as a light, indicating which lever to press in order to be rewarded with a sip of water.

When the encoder rat pressed the correct lever, brain activity indicating its  decision was translated into signals of electrical stimulation and transmitted directly to the brain of the decoder rat.

The encoder rat, unlike his partner, wasn’t given the same kind of visual cue to indicate which lever to press to obtain the reward.

So, in order to get the sip of water, the decoder rat had to rely strictly on the information transmitted by the encoder rat via the brain-to-brain electronic interface.

Researchers found the decoder rat responded to the electronic cues about 70 percent of the time.

The researchers also learned that the brain-to-brain interface provided two-way communications between the two rats which allowed them to help each other.

An encoder rat fitted with a brain-to-brain interface (Duke University)

“We saw that when the decoder rat committed an error, the encoder basically changed both its brain function and behavior to make it easier for its partner to get it right,” Nicolelis said. “The encoder improved the signal-to-noise ratio of its brain activity that represented the decision, so the signal became cleaner and easier to detect.”

The researchers even took an encoder to Brazil while the decoder rat remained in a North Carolina lab. Despite the distance, scientists were able to send brain wave signals between the rats via the internet and found that they were still able to work together.

“So, even though the animals were on different continents, with the resulting noisy transmission and signal delays, they could still communicate,” said Miguel Pais-Vieira, a postdoctoral fellow and author of the study. “This tells us that it could be possible to create a workable, network of animal brains distributed in many different locations.”

The study with the details of the research and findings were published recently in  Scientific Reports.

Eating breakfast may help keep you from getting fat and making poor food choices (Photo: Angela de Março via Flickr/Creative Commons)

Skipping breakfast sets the brain up to make poor food choices later in the day, according to a new study.

Scientists from the MRC Clinical Science Centre at London’s Imperial College, compared the brain scans and eating patterns of people both after eating breakfast and when they were fasting.

They found that those who avoid breakfast may overeat throughout the rest of the day, often choosing high-calorie or junk food over healthier selections.

The researchers studied the magnetic resonance images (MRIs) of 21 volunteer test subjects who didn’t eat anything before coming in for their tests.  On one those visits, the volunteers were first given a 750-calorie breakfast before the researchers ran the MRI scans.

On another visit to the research center, the test subjects weren’t fed any breakfast, but were always served lunch after each scanning session.

“Through both the participants’ MRI results and observations of how much they ate at lunch, we found ample evidence that fasting made people hungrier, and increased the appeal of high-calorie foods and the amount people ate,” said Dr. Tony Goldstone, who led the study.

Researchers believe the brain’s orbitofrontal cortex (highlighted in this MRI image) might play a key role in influencing food choices. (MRI Image: Paul Wicks via Wikimedia Commons)

While examining the MRIs of volunteers who hadn’t eaten breakfast, the scientists found a variation in the pattern of activity in the orbitofrontal cortex, that’s the area of the brain located right above the eyes that can affect decisions concerning the appeal and reward value of food.

When participants who were fasting or didn’t eat any breakfast were shown pictures of high-calorie food,  the MRIs showed that that portion of the brain was “activated,” a reaction less strong when they had eaten breakfast.

After studying and comparing the MRI scans over a period of time, the researchers were able to use the brain scans to predict which of their test subjects would be the mostly likely to respond strongly to high-calorie foods.

To Goldstone and his colleagues, these findings suggest  the orbitofrontal cortex may play a key role in influencing people in making their food choices.

They also say their research complements previous studies that show fasting may not be the best way to lose weight, since doing so tends to create a “bias” in the brain that makes us seek a high-calorie food reward.

Nutritionists recommend foods with protein (eggs/lean meat), whole grains, and fruits or vegetables, for a healthy breakfast (Photo: Kenji Ross via Flickr/Creative Commons)

Eating a healthy breakfast doesn’t necessarily mean sitting down to a formal meal or even eating traditional breakfast foods like cereals or eggs.

You can mix up the food items you want to eat for breakfast and that could also include eating some of those tasty leftovers from the previous night’s dinner.

Here are some tips and suggestions on healthy breakfast choices from the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics:

• Include some lean protein, such as eggs, cheese, deli meat, peanut butter, Canadian bacon or yogurt
• Pair that lean protein with a whole-grain carbohydrate food, such as a whole-grain cereal, bread, waffles, pancakes or oatmeal
• Be sure to include fruits and vegetables to your breakfast  Top off yogurt with some fruit or chop up some veggies to add to your omelet
• To save time, nutritionists suggest prepping breakfast the night before

After being injected with an opiate-like chemical produced in the human brain, laboratory rats ate twice the normal amount of sweet fatty food. (Photo: Alexandra Difeliceantonio)

Are you on a diet but  having a hard time resisting that candy bar or cheeseburger?  The problem  might really be in your head.

Researchers have found that an opium-like chemical produced in the brain might explain why some people overeat sweet and fatty foods.

“This means that the brain has more extensive systems to make individuals want to over consume rewards than previously thought,” says Alexandra DiFeliceantonio of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, who led the study. “It may be one reason why over-consumption is a problem today.”

The researchers found  a region of the brain called the neostriatum, located near the middle and front of the brain, which is best known for  controlling motor movements. It also produces the opiate-like chemical called enkephalin, which  DiFeliceantonio says sparks and intensifies the urge to consume pleasant rewards.

To make their findings, DiFeliceantonio and her team injected some of the morphine-like drug directly into the neostriatum of their lab rats.  After the injections, the rats were fed candy-coated chocolate. The rodent test subjects ate more than twice the number of chocolates than they would normally have eaten.

The researchers also found the levels of enkephalin – the opium-like chemical manufactured by the neostriatum – surged when the rats began to eat the  candy. And while the enkephalins, or comparable drugs, didn’t actually make the rats enjoy the candy more, they did increase their cravings and compulsion to eat them.

“The same brain area we tested here is active when obese people see foods and when drug addicts see drug scenes,” says DiFeliceantonio. “It seems likely that our enkephalin findings in rats mean that this neurotransmitter may drive some forms of overconsumption and addiction in people.”

DiFeliceantonio says the findings  reveal a lot about our tendency to binge and could eventually lead to the development a drug that  blocks the impulse to overeat.

A new study finds the brain processes vision differently in men than in women. (Photo: Adam Cuerden (L) and Petar Milošević (R) via Wikimedia Creative Commons

In the battle of the sexes, it’s been said that men and women see things differently. Now, a new scientific study could back that view up.

Published in  Biology of Sex Differences, the report finds that the part of the brain which processes vision works differently in men than  in women.

While men have greater visual sensitivity to fine detail and rapidly-moving stimuli, women are better at discriminating between colors.

The brain’s visual cortex- highlighted by color (Image: Chavez01 via Wikimedia/Creative Commons)

Scientists say there are high concentrations of androgen – male sex hormone receptors – in the cerebral cortex in both sexes, especially in the visual cortex, the part of the brain which processes images.

Androgen is also responsible for controlling the development of neurons within the visual cortex as the human embryo forms and develops. Since it is a male sex hormone receptor, men have 25 percent more of these neurons than females.

The researchers, from Brooklyn and Hunter Colleges of the City University of New York, compared the vision of men and women  over the age of 16.

The scientists recruited staff and students from local high schools and colleges. All of the study volunteers had  normal color vision and 20/20 vision, either naturally or when corrected by glasses or contact lenses.

First, the researchers  had their volunteers describe colors shown to them from across the visual spectrum.  They quickly found that men’s color vision shifted and that they required a slightly longer wavelength of light in order to experience the same color hue as women. They also found that the guys were less able to discriminate between colors.

A new study suggests women are better at discriminating between colors than men. (Photo: Ramesh NG via Wikimedia/Creative Commons)

Next, the researchers wanted to measure the contrast-sensitivity functions (CSF). They displayed an image of light and dark, horizontal or vertical, bars to volunteers who then chose which of the two images they saw.  When the researchers alternated between the light and dark bars, the image appeared to flicker.

Researchers also varied the change speed of the  images and how close the bars were to each other. They found that,  when the images changed at a moderate rate of speed, the volunteers lost sensitivity for seeing the close together bars, but gained sensitivity when the bars were farther apart.

The researchers noticed that men, as compared to the women, could better resolve the more rapidly changing images of the bars that were closer together.

“As with other senses, such as hearing and the olfactory system, there are marked sex differences in vision between men and women,” says Israel Abramov, a professor who led the study.

Mouse and keyboard… that’s how most of us interact with our computer. You either click at or type in your data.  We’ve pretty much have gotten used to operating our PC’s and other like devices this way… for some its become second nature.  But, how about a new way interact with that computer? Can you imagine being able to operate a computer or some sort of robotic device by just thinking about it?  Well, it could be a reality sooner than you realize.

For the last 10 to 15 years, scientists from around the world have been hard at work on  a new form of technology called the Brain Computer Interface (BCI).  The BCI is a piece of equipment designed to oversee and interpret the electrical impulses of the user’s thoughts. It then converts that information into some kind of machine control – which in turn, can operate those computers and robotic devices.

A number of experiments conducted over the past several years have produced results – in both animal and human subjects - where such machine control is accomplished with brain signals alone.

Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have adapted brain-computer interfaces like the one shown above to listen to regions of the brain that control speech. The development may help restore capabilities lost to brain injury or disability. (Photo: Eric Leuthardt, MD)

According to a new study published in the Institute of Physics Journal of Neural Engineering, researchers from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, recently demonstrated that humans can control a cursor on a computer screen using words spoken out loud and in their head. This could lead to the development of a variety of applications for those who may have limited physical ability but also those who lost their speech through brain injury.

Scientists found that by directly connecting a patient’s brain to a computer via a technique called electrocortiography (ECoG) – which involves placing electrodes directly onto a patient’s brain – the computer could be controlled with up to 90 percent accuracy, even when no prior training was given.

The trials involved patients sitting in front of a screen and trying to move a cursor toward a target using predefined words that were associated with specific directions. For instance, saying or thinking of the word “Ah” would move the cursor right.

The researchers hope that, at some point in the future, they can permanently insert implants into a patient’s brain to help restore functionality and, even more impressively, read someone’s mind.

“This is one of the earliest examples, to a very, very small extent, of what is called ‘reading minds’ — detecting what people are saying to themselves in their internal dialogue,” says the study’s lead author, Dr. Eric C Leuthardt from the Washington University School of Medicine. “We want to see if we cannot just detect when you’re saying ‘dog,’ ‘tree’, ‘tool’ or some other word, but also learn what the pure idea of that looks like in your mind. It’s exciting and a little scary to think of reading minds, but it has incredible potential for people who can’t communicate or are suffering from other disabilities.”

Watch a video featuring Dr. Leuthardt on this topic – “The Emerging World of ECoG Neuroprosthetics”