Eyewitness testimony is shockingly unreliable. How unreliable? Ask Elizabeth Loftus.
-
Lee, Whittington, and Kopell review recent studies of the role of beta-band oscillations in top-down control of attention and model it. In their model, top-down beta rhythms activate layer-specific ascending projections that mediate biased competition. Interneurons resonate with the beta oscillations and help modulate superficial layer activity according to attentional demands.
-
Slideshow: The 6th Annual Dana and Betty Fisher Retreat of MIT’s Picower Institute for Learning and Memory
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mu-0CW5Nyl4&feature=share -
Bursting the Neuro-Utopian Bubble
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/08/11/bursting-the-neuro-utopian-bubble/?smid=fb-share&_r=0Where do you begin to correct this guy?
1. Neuroscience is ignoring and usurping the treatment of mental illness by the traditional methods of “talking and working with one another to the end of personal self-realization and social harmony”.
Umm, that doesn’t work very well. So, this is a plus in my book.2. The solution to curing disease is to erase all poverty?
Let’s assume that’s true (it’s not). How do we do that?
This reminds me of the Monty Python sketch How To Do It
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNfGyIW7aHM3. Freud? Seriously?
That’s enough time wasted on this.
-
A review of the groundbreaking work of Patricia Goldman-Rakic by Amy Arnsten
-
Lopour et al report evidence for phase coding in the human temporal lobe. They recorded local field potentials (LFPs) in patients during performance of a card matching task. Classification of correct/incorrect responses was better when LFP phase was taken into account. The phases aligned just before the the two cards were compared and then diverged to code the response.
-
Vinck, Womelsdorf, Fries review the role of gamma band synchronization in information transfer in the cortex. They argue that due to feedforward coincidence detection and phase-coupling, gamma synchronization is important for flexible routing of information and may be an important determinant of spike rate coding.
-
Christian Ruff pays tribute to the late, great, Jon Driver by reviewing neural mechanisms of top-down control of attention and memory.
-
A review in Science of Sue Corkin’s book on the famous neuropsychology patient H.M., who could no longer form memories after his hippocampus was removed.
Permanent Present Tense The Unforgettable Life of the Amnesic Patient, H.M. by Suzanne Corkin Basic Books, New York, 2013. 400 pp. $28.99, C$32. ISBN 9780465031597. Allen Lane, London. £20. ISBN 9781846142710.
-
Jutras et al find a relationship between hippocampal theta and visual exploration via saccadic eye movements. Saccades caused a theta reset that was predictive of subsequent recognition of visual images. Enhanced theta power before stimulus onset was also predictive of recognition.