Learning and memory are generally thought to be composed of three major steps: encoding events into the brain network, storing the encoded information, and later retrieving it for recall.
Much of Professor Emeritus Richard Wurtman’s career in MIT’s Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences revolved around developing new treatments for diseases and conditions by modifying chemicals
When you enter a room, your brain is bombarded with sensory information. If the room is a place you know well, most of this information is already stored in long-term memory.
Working memory is a sort of “mental sketchpad” that allows you to accomplish everyday tasks such as calling in your hungry family’s takeout order and finding the bathroom you were just told “will b
MIT neuroscientists have found evidence that the brain’s ability to control what it’s thinking about relies on low-frequency brain waves known as beta rhythms.
Our daily lives include hundreds of routine habits.
MIT neuroscientists have uncovered a cellular pathway that allows specific synapses to become stronger during memory formation.
Everyday experience makes it obvious — sometimes frustratingly so — that our working memory capacity is limited. We can only keep so many things consciously in mind at once.
It’s often said that experience is the best teacher, but the experiences of other people may be even better.
Through compelling personal stories and dramatic research evidence, speakers at the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory’s recent “Early Life Stress and Mental Health” symposium showed that pe
