For a few days in November, the McGovern Institute hummed with invented languages. Strangers greeted one another in Esperanto; trivia games were played in High Valyrian; Klingon and Na’vi were heard inside MRI scanners. Creators and users of these constructed languages (conlangs) had gathered at MIT in the name of neuroscience. McGovern Institute investigator Evelina […]
This story originally appeared in the Winter 2023 issue of BrainScan. __ Many people barely consider how their bodies move — at least not until movement becomes more difficult due to injury or disease. But the McGovern scientists who are working to understand human movement and restore it after it has been lost know that the […]
Bipolar disorder often begins in childhood or adolescence, triggering dramatic mood shifts and intense emotions that cause problems at home and school. But the condition is often overlooked or misdiagnosed until patients are older. New research suggests that machine learning, a type of artificial intelligence, could help by identifying children who are at risk of […]
MIT neuroscientists have discovered that the adult brain contains millions of “silent synapses” — immature connections between neurons that remain inactive until they’re recruited to help form new memories. Until now, it was believed that silent synapses were present only during early development, when they help the brain learn the new information that it’s exposed […]
Building on the CRISPR gene-editing system, MIT researchers have designed a new tool that can snip out faulty genes and replace them with new ones, in a safer and more efficient way. Using this system, the researchers showed that they could deliver genes as long as 36,000 DNA base pairs to several types of human […]
Explore our labs, learn about our tools and technologies, and meet some of our brain researchers — all with the click of a mouse. With technical support and guidance from the MIT.nano Immersion Lab, our team took more than 500 panoramic photographs of the McGovern Institute and stitched them together to create this immersive experience, […]
The Society for Neuroscience (SfN) has awarded the Swartz Prize for Theoretical and Computational Neuroscience to Ila Fiete, professor in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, associate member of the McGovern Institute for Brain Research, and director of the K. Lisa Yang Integrative Computational Neuroscience Center. The SfN, the world’s largest neuroscience organization, announced […]
When we press our temples to soothe an aching head or rub an elbow after an unexpected blow, it often brings some relief. It is believed that pain-responsive cells in the brain quiet down when these neurons also receive touch inputs, say scientists at MIT’s McGovern Institute, who for the first time have watched this […]
Many children struggle to learn to read, and studies have shown that students from a lower socioeconomic status (SES) background are more likely to have difficulty than those from a higher SES background. MIT neuroscientists have now discovered that the types of difficulties that lower-SES students have with reading, and the underlying brain signatures, are, […]
