Somewhere in your skull, right now, a small cluster of neurons in your medial habenula is doing something rather extraordinary. If you've ever experienced nicotine withdrawal - that particular brand of irritability that makes you want to throttle strangers for minor infractions like existing -...
The Olympics are back in the news cycle, and with them come the inevitable slow-motion replays of gymnasts sticking landings and divers entering the water with zero splash. Sports commentators love to wax poetic about "muscle memory," as if your biceps had somehow enrolled in community college. But...
You know that one enzyme in your mitochondria that quietly recycles carbon atoms like some kind of molecular Marie Kondo? Turns out it's been moonlighting as a bodyguard for your brain's most vulnerable neurons, and when it clocks out early, things go sideways fast.
Picture this: a patient walks into my clinic complaining about constipation that's been getting worse for fifteen years. No big deal, right? Happens to a lot of people. Then, a decade later, that same patient comes back - this time with a tremor in their right hand. Two very different complaints,...
Think of your brain as a sprawling metropolis. The prefrontal cortex is downtown - the business district where rational decisions get made and executive orders flow to the rest of the city. The amygdala? That's the 24-hour alarm center, always monitoring for threats. Between them run information...
Here's something that'll flip your bedtime lecture on its head: some teenagers who sleep less than eight hours a night are doing just fine. Their brains are basically shrugging and saying, "We got this." Meanwhile, other short-sleeping teens are quietly collecting neurological IOUs that come due...
In five years, this discovery might mean your doctor runs a quick genetic test before prescribing medication for alcohol use disorder, and instead of the current coin-flip odds of treatment success, you get a therapy tailored to your brain's specific wiring. That future got a lot closer thanks to a...
Dear parietal cortex,
What if the same cells that protect you from the flu decided to set up shop inside your brain after a stroke - not to help, but to make things dramatically worse?
You know that feeling when someone you love gently strokes your arm and your entire nervous system seems to exhale? Turns out your body has an entire class of nerve fibres dedicated to precisely that moment - and science is only now working out how the whole operation runs.