Who hasn't felt the temptation to fling a lengthy manual into the bin, or just drive on instead of asking for directions? After all, following instructions is often tiresome, and we can just figure it out on our own… Or can we? A study published today (May 19th) in the scientific journal Nature Human Behaviour challenges prevalent theories about our capacity to solve complex problems and how certain mental disorders influence it.

Sabine Renninger

POST DOCTORAL RESEARCHER, VISION TO ACTION LAB

"Have you ever walked to school or work and suddenly seen something that has always been there but that you never noticed before? Since childhood, such moments have made me wonder about what the world really looks like and what is just my perception of it.

A fruit fly walks on a small styrofoam ball fashioned into a floating 3D treadmill. The room is completely dark, and yet, an electrode recording visual neurons in the fly’s brain relays a mysterious stream of neural activity, rising and falling like a sinusoidal wave.

When Eugenia Chiappe, a neuroscientist at the Champalimaud Foundation in Portugal, first saw these results, she had a hunch her team had made an exceptional discovery. They were recording from visual neurons, but the room was dark, so there was no visual signal that could drive the neurons in that manner. 

Among neurological disorders, which are now the world’s leading cause of disability, Parkinson’s disease (PD) is the fastest growing. With over 6 million individuals affected worldwide, that number is expected to reach over 12 million by 2040.

At long last, this year CR researchers were finally able to celebrate Brain Awareness Week in the best way possible - doing science with kids! The activities took place over two days, one at a school in Amadora and the other at Lisbon’s Science Centre, called “Pavilhão do Conhecimento”.