When we learn a new skill, the brain has to decide—cell by cell—what to change. New research from MIT suggests it can do that with surprising precision, sending targeted feedback to individual neurons so each one can adjust its activity in the right direction. The finding echoes a key idea from modern artificial intelligence. Many […]
Fifteen innovation pioneers, including McGovern Investigator Feng Zhang, have been inducted into the 2026 class of the National Inventors Hall of Fame. Zhang is being recognized for his innovations in gene editing and for sharing his resources and expertise broadly with the global scientific community. In addition to his appointment at the McGovern Institute, Zhang […]
The ability to use language to communicate is one of things that makes us human. At MIT’s McGovern Institute, scientists led by Evelina Fedorenko have defined an entire network of areas within the brain dedicated to this ability, which work together when we speak, listen, read, write, or sign. Much of the language network lies […]
Experience is a powerful teacher—and not every experience has to be our own to help us understand the world. What happens to others is instructive, too. That’s true for humans as well as for other social animals. New research from scientists at the McGovern Institute shows what happens in the brains of monkeys as they […]
As people age, their immune system function declines. T cell populations become smaller and can’t react to pathogens as quickly, making people more susceptible to a variety of infections. To try to overcome that decline, researchers at MIT and the Broad Institute have found a way to temporarily program cells in the liver to improve […]
This story also appears in the Winter 2026 issue of BrainScan. *** Neuroscientists today have the most spectacular views of brains that the field has ever seen. Modern microscopes can reveal extraordinary levels of detail, offering scientists another piece of the vast and intricate puzzle of how neurons interconnect. A comprehensive wiring diagram of the […]
For decades, scientists with big questions about biology have found answers in a tiny worm. That worm–a millimeter-long creature called Caenorhabditis elegans–has helped researchers uncover fundamental features of how cells and organisms work. The impact of that work is enormous: Discoveries made using C. elegans have been recognized with four Nobel prizes and have led […]
Synapse-resolution connectomics The synaptic connectivity of neurons, their connectome, is fundamental to how networks of neurons function. Sven Dorkenwald develops computational and collaborative tools to map, analyze, and interpret synapse-resolution connectomes. His work has led to large connectomic reconstructions of the fruit fly brain and parts of mammalian brains. He uses these connectomes to investigate […]
On this day, December 10th, nearly 120 years ago, Santiago Ramón y Cajal received a Nobel Prize for capturing and interpreting the very first images of the brain’s most essential components — neurons. “Many scientists consider Cajal the progenitor of neuroscience because he was the first to really see the brain for what it was: […]
