A journalist navigates a world forever changed by her traumatic brain injury.
brain
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Man Who Controls Computers With His Mind
After an accident in 2006, Dennis DeGray became paralyzed from the collarbones down. Eager to participate in experimental research in the area of brain-computer interfaces, DeGray has electrode arrays embedded in his cortex, and is one of a few dozen people in the world who can control various forms of technology with his thoughts. If […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Early Roots of Surgery
The first recorded cases of cancer show how the Ancient Egyptians used cauterisation (using red-hot instruments to burn off tissue and seal off wounds) to destroy tumours and to treat a variety of infections, diseases and bleeding lesions. Until the mid-18th century, surgery was the only effective option for addressing several conditions. But it was […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
Looking at Five Generations of a Single Dutch Family to Understand the Genetics of Violence
A short piece published in BBC Magazine explored the science of whether murderers are born or made. A British neurocriminologist named Adrian Raine has made a career out of studying the brains of violent criminals. Raine was the first person to conduct a brain imaging study on murderers, and has since scanned the brains of numerous homicidal individuals, looking for similarities. […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
‘My Brain Was Changed Forever’
And, I found, I could not lie. I could not write fiction. So instead I wrote the truth. I started an anonymous blog on which I chronicled my stroke recovery as a writer. It connected me to friends that I have to this day. I became an introvert. I learned to protect my energy, something […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
‘We Don’t Know What Is Changing in the Hippocampi of Taxi Drivers.’
A study by neurologists at University College London found that the hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for spatial navigation, of a London cabby is significantly larger than those in the rest of the human population—a result of the intense memorization and route-finding undertaken while doing The Knowledge. The study involved taking regular brain […]
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Researchers study a small group of patients who underwent surgery that split their brains: Through studies of this group, neuroscientists now know that the healthy brain can look like two markedly different machines, cabled together and exchanging a torrent of data. But when the primary cable is severed, information — a word, an object, a […]