Human Intelligence Through Brain Scans

Researchers at Yale led a study that demonstrate fluid intelligence (defined by abstract reasoning) can be measured by the functional connectivity of 268 specific brain regions. Emily Finn, co-author of this study, said, “The more certain regions are talking to one another, the better you’re able to process information quickly and make inferences.” Mostly, fluid intelligence had to do with the connections between the frontal and parietal lobes. The stronger and swifter the communication between these two regions, the better one’s score in the abstract thinking test.Earlier, same researchers have demonstrated that a person’s brain activity appears to be as unique as his or her fingerprints. Using brain imaging data, researcher were able to identify individuals.

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Experiment proves Reality does not exist until it is measured

Physicists at The Australian National University have conducted John Wheeler's delayed-choice thought experiment, which involves a moving object that is given the choice to act like a particle or a wave. Wheeler's experiment then asks — at which point does the object decide? Common sense says the object is either wave-like or particle-like, independent of how we measure it. But quantum physics predicts that whether you observe wave like behavior (interference) or particle behavior (no interference) depends only on how it is actually measured at the end of its journey.

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Schizophrenia and the Teenage Brain: How Can Imaging Help?

Adolescence is a dangerous time for the onset of mental health problems. Advances in brain imaging are helping to picture how neural changes in these crucial years can lead to chronic debilitating mental illness.

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Space Telescope Tech Miniaturized to Look into the Brain

Optical technologies previously used to look at the stars in the sky will be miniaturized to look inside the brain, and could lead to new treatments for neurological diseases. The technologies once used to make corrections to space telescopes, along with new lasers, will help answer a fundamental question, according to Prakash Kara, Ph.D., a researcher at the Medical University of South Carolina. Kara is part of a team at MUSC that was awarded a $4 million grant from the National Science Foundation through its Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR). The grant will fund collaborative research between MUSC and the University of Alabama at Birmingham to map changes in blood flow when specific neurons in the brain fire.

Dr. Prakash Kara says new equipment funded by the grant will dramatically improve researchers' ability to capture images deep in the brain. (Credit: Sarah Pack)

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