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I need some advice for a friend of mine from my church. Since none of you know where I go or who he is, I can protect his anonymity. He doesn't know I'm doing this. He seemed a bit upset at church this weekend, so I asked what happened. Here's what he told me: Last Tuesday, he was on Facebook. He noticed that he'd received a private message from someone he'd 'friended' about a month earlier. This woman was a high-school acquaintance, one of several he's added to his friend list in anticipation of his 30-year high school reunion coming...

In 1984, George Orwell told the story of Winston Smith, an employee in the propaganda office of a totalitarian regime. Smith's job at the fictional Ministry of Truth was to destroy photographs and alter documents, remaking the past to fit the needs of the present. But 1984 came and went, along with Soviet communism. In the age of the Internet, nobody could tamper with the past that way. Could they? Yes, we can. In fact, last week, Slate did. We took the Ministry of Truth as our model. Here's how Orwell described its work: As soon as all the corrections...

Snails on speed don't get speedier—but their supercharged brains do learn better and make memories that last much longer, a new study says. Scientists gave pond snails the amphetamine crystal meth to explore the memory-related brain processes that get humans so hooked on the drug. Human meth users experience sensations of happiness and high self-esteem that help make the drug extremely addictive. Scientists suspect that such cravings may be tied to powerful "pathological memories" that make such highs difficult to forget. "We were not trying to addict the snails," said study co-author Barbara Sorg, a biochemist at Washington State University...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – A scan of brain activity can effectively read a person's mind, researchers said Thursday. British scientists from University College London found they could differentiate brain activity linked to different memories and thereby identify thought patterns by using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The evidence suggests researchers can tell which memory of a past event a person is recalling from the pattern of their brain activity alone. "We've been able to look at brain activity for a specific episodic memory -- to look at actual memory traces," said senior author of the study, Eleanor Maguire. "We found that...

Those who live in industrialized countries have easy access to healthy food and nutritional supplements, but magnesium deficiencies are still common. That's a problem because new research from Tel Aviv University suggests that magnesium, a key nutrient for the functioning of memory, may be even more critical than previously thought for the neurons of children and healthy brain cells in adults. Dr. Inna Slutsky of TAU's Sackler School of Medicine published results of a 5-year probe which has significant implications for the use of over-the-counter magnesium supplements.

OK OK.....I know this may seem a silly and simplistic topic/post in such an age. Still, I just wanted to share a little "trick" with my fellow FReepers that has served me very well over the years. I've taught this to many; all have been grateful. We all, especially us FReepers, take in so much information in a typical day (work, home, FR, TV, talk radio, etc.) that often it is very difficult to recall certain facts; certain information. You know that feeling...."..oh darn it, what's-his-name....I can't remember"; or "...oh you know, that movie with...ummm....dang it...". Here's the key: NEVER...

UA researchers find naps are an integral part of learning for infants, helping the developing brain retain new informationAnyone who grew up in a large family likely remembers hearing "Don't wake the baby." While it reinforces the message to older kids to keep it down, research shows that sleep also is an important part of how infants learn more about their new world. Rebecca Gomez, Richard Bootzin and Lynn Nadel in the psychology department at the University of Arizona in Tucson found that babies who are able to get in a little daytime nap are more likely to exhibit an...

Findings suggest that a biphasic sleep schedule not only refreshes the mind, but can make you smarterIf you see a student dozing in the library or a co-worker catching 40 winks in her cubicle, don't roll your eyes. New research from the University of California, Berkeley, shows that an hour's nap can dramatically boost and restore your brain power. Indeed, the findings suggest that a biphasic sleep schedule not only refreshes the mind, but can make you smarter. Conversely, the more hours we spend awake, the more sluggish our minds become, according to the findings. The results support previous data...

Working on someone's PC which can only handle 768MB of memory. The problem is this: crucial.com says there is a 32MB (stick?) somewhere installed in the PC, so until I find a way to disable that 32MB, I can't install one 512MB stick and another 256MB stick to equal the 768MB (because that "phantom" 32MB puts me overboard). Right now, if I put in both a 256 and a 512, it's too much memory and the screen freezes up and I get the dreaded BSOD. Any idea where crucial.com is picking up this 32MB? My guess is that it's the...

A hot new trend in fitness is hitting retirement communities in Minnesota, but this is a workout for your brain. As one ages, one of the things that can sometimes begin to fade is the memory. But now there's a workout for the brain that really gets the wheels turning. It's new and now part of the wellness program at Friendship Village in Bloomington. Bob, 91, and Mary Morris, 89, have made the Dakim Brain Fitness program part of their weekly workout. Mr. Morris goes for it five days a week. It's hooked into the internet and set-up like a...

[PRESS RELEASE, 10 November 2009] Researchers at Karolinska Institutet have discovered a mechanism that controls the brain's ability to create lasting memories. In experiments on genetically manipulated mice, they were able to switch on and off the animals' ability to form lasting memories by adding a substance to their drinking water. The findings, which are published in the scientific journal PNAS, are of potential significance to the future treatment of Alzheimer's and stroke. Lars Olson Photo: Camilla Svensk "We are constantly being swamped with sensory impression," says Professor Lars Olson, who led the study. "After a while, the brain must...

Red-eye flights, all-night study sessions, and extra-inning playoff games all deprive us of sleep and can leave us forgetful the next day. Now scientists have discovered that lost sleep disrupts a specific molecule in the brain's memory circuitry, possibly leading to treatments for tired brains. Neuroscientists studying rodents and humans have found that sleep deprivation interrupts the storage of episodic memories: information about who, what, when, and where. To lay down these memories, neurons in our brains form new connections with other neurons or strengthen old ones. This rewiring process, which occurs over a period of hours, requires a rat's...

Implant false memories by 'seizing control of circuits. Posted in Biology, 16th October 2009 13:43 GMT An alliance of boffins from Oxford University and Virginia, America say they have developed a technique for "writing directly to memory" in a living brain, "seizing control of brain circuits" to create a memory of an experience which had never actually happened. Thus far, according to the research, the technique works reliably only on flies. "Flies have the ability to learn, but the circuits that instruct memory formation were unknown," says Oxford insect-brain expert Gero Miesenböck. "We were able to pin the essential component...

(July 20) - You probably recall little of your days in the womb, but a new study suggests that short-term memory may be present in fetuses at 30 weeks of age. Until a few decades ago, "people would say that the human fetus is a sort of black box," said Dr. Jan Nijhuis, a co-author of the study and an obstetrician at Maastricht University Medical Center in The Netherlands. Studies over the years have started to reveal more about the neurological development of humans before they are born, but researchers are still trying to figure out when memory begins and...

They weigh less than 3 pounds, usually, and are perhaps 15 inches long. But they can remember. The unborn have memories, according to medical researchers who used sound and vibration stimulation, combined with sonography, to reveal that the human fetus displays short-term memory from at least 30 weeks gestation - or about two months before they are born.

Fetuses found to have memories By Jennifer Harper July 16, 2009 They weigh less than 3 pounds, usually, and are perhaps 15 inches long. But they can remember. The unborn have memories, according to medical researchers who used sound and vibration stimulation, combined with sonography, to reveal that the human fetus displays short-term memory from at least 30 weeks gestation - or about two months before they are born. "In addition, results indicated that 34-week-old fetuses are able to store information and retrieve it four weeks later," said the research, which was released Wednesday. Scientists from the Department of Obstetrics...

July 16, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - 30-week-old babies in the womb already have short-term memory capabilities, a new study from the Netherlands, published in the July/August 2009 issue of the journal Child Development, has found.Researchers at Maastricht University Medical Centre and the University Medical Centre St. Radboud examined 93 healthy pregnant Dutch women and their unborn children, measuring changes in how the child responds to repeated stimulation. The children were tested at 30, 32, 34, and 36 weeks, and again at 38 weeks gestation.  The study showed that the unborn children would initially respond to a "vibroacoustic" stimulus. The stimulus would...

Researchers have found that taking a supplement of omega 3 for six months had a beneficial effect on people with age-related forgetfulness and loss of learning ability. They tested the affect of docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), which is most commonly found in fish oil, on 485 healthy people and found that memory and general brain function increased significantly. The research, based on volunteers with an average age of 70, showed taking 900mg capsules every day was the equivalent of turning back the clock three years, it was found. Now it is hoped that further studies could show that the fatty acid...

The prevailing view among parents, the general public and mental health professionals that infants as young as six months old "do not remember" traumatic events that happen to them or to their loved ones has recently been disproved, a professor of infant mental health said at a Jerusalem conference on Sunday.... [snip] ... Most professionals and parents have pooh-poohed this idea because infants and young toddlers do not have the verbal ability to describe the trauma, but it nevertheless is stored in their brains, she asserted....[snip]... People are wrong to assume that when traumatized infants grow up and don't speak...

SAN FRANCISCO — Maybe it’s time to retire the “senior moment.” These lapses of memory during everyday life — losing your keys or your train of thought — are thought to be more common in older people. Not so, researchers from the University of Waterloo in Canada report March 21 at the annual meeting of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society. Researcher Amanda Clark and her colleagues surveyed 30 adults younger than 25 and 24 people ages 60 to 80 to find out how many slips they make each day. The researchers also devised two lab tests to study attention. One involved...