The Cancer That Itches
A "deep" itch can signal that something's really wrong. 02.15.2008
74. Musical Scales Mimic the Sound of Language
The harmonics of human vocalization may generate the frequencies used in music. 01.14.2008
24. Fish Fats Protect Retinas in Mice
12.21.2007
Birds Navigate Using Magnetic Compass-Vision
Combined with a GPS beak, it leads them on marathon migrations. 10.30.2007
The Most Important Future Military Technologies
Super lasers, binoculars that read minds, manipulating the "human terrain"... 10.04.2007
Shifty Eyes Provide Super Human Vision
Without jittery eye motion, our most powerful sense is blunted. 10.02.2007
Pavlovian Cockroaches Learn Like Dogs (and Humans)
Training bugs may help us understand our own brains. 09.05.2007
This is Your Brain on Video Games
Gaming sharpens thinking, social skills, and perception. 07.09.2007
Evolution in Your Brain
Gerald Edelman says only the fittest neurons survive. 07.03.2007
Lingua Ex Machina
Deaf Bedouin children created a complete language. 07.03.2007
Jaron’s World: Virtual Horizon
VR in the real world may soon surpass the famous glove from Minority Report. 05.11.2007
The Upside of Color Blindness
So what if you can’t be a pilot? 04.02.2007
Raw Data: Scents and Scents-Ability
Our clumsy noses won't win any sniffing contests, but we can use them to find chocolate. 03.15.2007
Blinded by Science: The New Hypnosis
It's benevolent, it's peaceful, and your iPod can be the hypnotist. 03.12.2007
Are We All Synesthetes?
Hear a painting, taste a symphony, and smell a color—is this what we do subconsciously? 12.15.2006
Wishful Seeing
Visual perception versus reality 08.17.2006
How to Make Anything Look Like a Toy, Round II
More visual candy from artist Olivo Barbieri 08.16.2006
Jaron's World: Heads-Up
Why your next telephone may come mounted on a neck. 07.30.2006
Seeing Machine
A new device uses LED light to give a blind poet sight. 07.28.2006
Not Your Father's Bifocals
The future of senior vision 07.01.2006
How To Make Anything Look Like a Toy
It's a small world after all that frame tilting. 07.01.2006
Raw Data: Restoring Eyesight to the Blind
06.25.2006
Rain Man's Brain Explained
Autistic children can mimic faces, but they can't read expressions. 05.28.2006
Jaron's World: I Smell, Therefore I Think
Did odors give rise to the first words? 05.27.2006
Born to Run
Humans are not the fastest animal in a sprint, but we're among running for the best-running species on Earth. 04.20.2006
The Future of Time
Can we increase productivity by revving up the neural pacemakers in the brain? 04.02.2006
Vanishing Vertigo
New device restores balance to the impaired. 03.31.2006
The Sensitive Side of the Unicorn Whale
03.03.2006
In Combat, Stick With the Color-Blind
03.03.2006
What You See Is What You Don't
02.20.2006
Why Fat Tastes So Good
02.20.2006
Dalai Lama Speaks Language of Science
Dalai Lama Speaks Language of Science 02.20.2006
The Nose Knows
12.01.2005
Focus Pocus
12.01.2005
Men Hear Women's Melodies
Men Hear Women's Melodies 11.22.2005
Canine Report
Canine Report 11.22.2005
Finding the Right Word Odor
Finding the Right Word Odor 09.09.2005
The Psychology of Déjà Vu
What really happens when moments in our lives seem to repeat themselves? 09.09.2005
The Chemistry of . . . Artificial Sweeteners
Pour a little fake sweetener on it, baby. 08.06.2005
Extreme States
Out-of-body experiences? Near-death experiences? Researchers are beginning to understand what's really going on. 07.24.2005
Can a Single Cell Recognize Your Face?
06.05.2005
For the Eyes Only
05.01.2005
The Physics of . . . Changing Lanes
Is traffic passing you by? Relax. You may be moving faster than you think 04.28.2005
The Biology of . . . Bitterness
By blocking the right taste receptors, biotech researchers turn bitter into sweet 03.31.2005
The Mind's Mirror Doubles the Pain
10.01.2004
A-maze-ing Mole Rats
04.21.2004
Scrambled!
02.05.2004
NeuroQuest
How your brain gobbles up visual clues 01.02.2004
Out With One Sense, in With Another
12.03.2003
NeuroQuest
How your body mistakes a cold front for a heat wave 12.03.2003
Appeal of the Rare
11.06.2003
Noise Patrol
08.01.2003
Physical Chemistry
Is it your smile? Your laugh? Or your armpits? The frustrating science of finding pheromones. 07.01.2003
Can You See With Your Tongue?
The brain is so adaptable, some researchers now think, that any of the five senses can be rewired 06.01.2003
Mona Lisa Smile
06.01.2003
Men don't feel Women's Pain
05.01.2003
NeuroQuest
Trick your brain into seeing a spectrum that isn't there 04.01.2003
Touching is Believing
04.01.2003
NeuroQuest
Why the brain gets tricked by optical illusions 01.01.2003
The Next Photography Revolution
Here comes a digital-camera chip that could change everything 12.01.2002
Wired for a Touch
12.01.2002
Taste It With Your Eyes
09.01.2002
Cured of the Rings
09.01.2002
Follow Up:
08.01.2002
I Know That Smell . . .
07.01.2002
Sight Unseen
Two years after Mike May regained his sight, he still can't recognize his own wife. 06.01.2002
Noise to the Ears
06.01.2002
The Biology of . . . Humor
In search of the cerebral funny bone 05.01.2002
The Mystery of the Stopped Clock
02.01.2002
The Biology of . . . Perfect Pitch
Can your child learn some of Mozart's magic? 12.01.2001
By the Numbers: Myopia's Bookish Ways
10.01.2001
Um, Can You Repeat the Question?
10.01.2001
The Genetic Mystery of Music
Does a mother's lullaby give an infant a better chance for survival? 08.01.2001
Artificial Sight
Just because we don't understand how the brain interprets the messages it gets from the eye doesn't mean we can't help the blind see again 08.01.2001
Sleepless in Space
05.01.2001
Tourist in a Taste Lab
The brain is the matermind of flavor but tongues are where it starts - and some are far more sensitive than others. 07.01.2000
Hidden in Plain Sight
05.01.2000
The Pain Is in the Brain
The biggest headache for headache researchers has always been: Where does the pain come from? The answer might seem obvious, but it's nothing less than a revolutionary discovery 03.01.2000
I See Music
03.01.2000
Do You See What They See?
Neuroscientists think people with synesthesia might open a window into the ultimate mystery of human consciousness. 12.01.1999
Eye of the Beast
The next time a panther stares you down, just try to imagine what the world looks like from its point of view 12.01.1999
A Window on Consciousness
People with a bizarre condition called synesthesia see sound, smell colors, and taste shapes. Neuroscientists think they might open a window into the ultimate mystery of human consciousness. 12.01.1999
The Physics of ... Singing
How a simple cough made us musical. 08.01.1999
Vital Signs
What did Mr. Leonard's back have to do with his eyesight? 06.01.1999
Sounds and the Sightless
02.01.1999
What's a Pinna For?
02.01.1999
Eyes of the Beheld
08.01.1998
Bird Brains
08.01.1998
Vital Signs: Sounds of Silence
An accident threatened Mr. Sinclair's poor hearing. Could microsurgery save his fragile world? 04.01.1998
The Neural Orchestra
09.01.1997
Music of the Hemispheres
Why can a toddler sing? Why is even the most ordinary human brain a library of melodies? 10.01.1996
Fast Feet, Slow Brains
09.01.1996
The Electronic Nose
Can't tell a Chateau Margaux '82 from an '84? Can't stop worrying whether you turned off the gas? Get a new nose. On a chip. 09.01.1996
Movie Vision
08.01.1996
Seeing Things
07.01.1996
Twenty-Twenty Fingers
07.01.1996
1996 Discover Awards: Sight
07.01.1996
Alexander the Optically Challenged
06.01.1996
Ego Boundaries, or the Fit of My Father's Shirt
A neuroscientist racks his brains to find where one person ends and another begins. 11.01.1995
The Smell Files
08.01.1995
The Brain That Misplaced Its Body
Though paralyzed on one side, Mrs. M. claimed she wasn't--at least until she had cold water poured in her ear. Then, for a while, her brain could again perceive her body. And a neuroscientist could glimpse a secret about how we construct reality. 05.01.1995
The Importance of Noses
They do more than smell: they contain tiny bones that keep us from getting dehydrated. 08.01.1994
Silence, Signs, and Wonder
What is it about our brains that gives us the capacity for language? 08.01.1994
Writing Right
Some written languages are a precise reflection of a people's speech, while others, like english, are a complete mess. Is this alphabetical evolution? Or the unequal application of logic to literacy? 06.01.1994
The Sniff of Legend
Human pheromones? Chemical sex attractants? And a sixth sense organ in the nose? What are we, animals? 04.01.1994
Like Chips in the Night
02.01.1994
Substitute Sensations
10.01.1993
The Vision Thing: Mainly in the Brain
The eye and brain work in a partnership to interpret conflicting signals from the outside world. Ultimately, we see whatever our brains think we should. 06.01.1993
Good Vibrations
We're under siege from age, drugs, and rock and roll, and all that stands between us and utter silence in 32,000 dancing hearing receptors. 06.01.1993
Making Senses
Can electronic devices make the blind see, the deaf hear? Quite possibly yes. Is that a good thing? 06.01.1993
Touching the Phantom
Amputees can feel missing hands grab a cup of coffee, missing feet itch, and missing legs ache. Behind these ghostly sensations lies the secret of touch. 06.01.1993
In the Realm of the Chemical
Smell and taste have helped us navigate a world of foul poisons and sweet, voluptuous pleasures. 06.01.1993
What is Consciousness?
Defining it is hard enough--giving it to a computer is even harder. 11.01.1992