Similar to tiny, hairy Yodas lifting X-wings from a swamp, rats have the ability to lift digital cubes and place them near a target. However, these rats are not using the Force. Instead, they are using their imagination.
“This research is remarkable,” says Mayank Mehta, a neurophysicist at UCLA. “It opens up numerous exciting possibilities.” Understanding the brain area involved in this feat could potentially aid in the diagnosis and treatment of memory disorders, he explains.
Neuroscientist Albert Lee and his colleagues investigate how brains can mentally travel back in time to revisit memories and jump forward to imagine future scenarios. These processes, often referred to as “mental time travel,” contribute to the richness and complexity of our inner mental lives, says Lee, who conducted the study at Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Research Campus in Ashburn, Va.
To delve into these intricate questions, the researchers began with a simpler one: “Can you be in one place and think about another place?” says Lee, who is currently an HHMI investigator at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. “The rat is not doing anything more complicated than that. We are not asking them to recall their summer vacation.”
2023-11-02 13:11:30
Link from www.sciencenews.org
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