Category Archives: Neuroscience techniques

‘Silence’ helps the brain encode information

Neuroscientists at NeuRA and UNSW Sydney have shown that the brain may ignore input known as ‘chatter’ and instead use periods of silence to register information about its environment. The scientists have challenged the conventional wisdom that neural activity is the main driver of human perception.   Dr Ingvars Birznieks and Dr Richard Vickery have developed a novel method of […]

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Lost in the landscape of the brain? Get out the atlas

This article originally appeared on The Brain Dialogue. Suzanne Shubart. Now brain travellers can track their explorations with highly-detailed maps created with state-of-the-art imaging technology. The Big Picture You’re lost in the desert and, after wandering for days, in the distance you spot a giant red rock jutting out of the barren landscape. Had you never encountered this landmark before […]

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Five things you may not know about MRI

Dr Michael Green is a physicist and has been working in MRI for 10 years. Graduating from Flinders University with a PhD in electron scattering, he worked at Williams College, MA, USA in laser spectroscopy before joining NeuRA working on brain elastography in Lynne Bilston’s laboratory. Michael was appointed as a senior research officer and has been a NIF Facilitation Fellow since […]

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The new age of brain maps

The laboratory of Prof George Paxinos is using technological advances in brain imaging to create new atlases of the anatomy of the nervous system. Brain researchers, no less than geographers, need maps and coordinate systems to navigate the brain and communicate their observations to each other. Think of a Google map depicting the shape of an island or the streets in a city. […]

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Visible neuroscience

Imaging techniques enable neuroscientists to learn about the structure and function of cells in the nervous system. Here, Dr Zoltán Rusznák shares some captivating images of the brain and how they were made. Neurons are the building block cells of the brain and spinal cord, communicating with each other through synapses to regulate nervous system function. Relating the shape, size, […]

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