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Discovering the brain mechanism of binding: study

Scientists at the Rotman Research Institute, Bernhard Ross, Takahiro Miyazaki and Takako Fujioka discovered the brain network, through which sound elements are combined into meaningful information. Using magnetoencephalography they demonstrated for the first time in humans that fast oscillations play a main role for binding of information, which had been suggested theoretically for a long time. The study, published in the European Journal of Neuroscience, demonstrates also how acoustical noise affects comprehension of the meaning of sound. The results of the study provide important tools for understanding the speech communication deficits in aging.

A neural information super-highway: study

Researchers—Bratislav Mišić,  Vasily Vakorin, Natasha Kovačević, Tomáš Paus,and Randy McIntosh—from Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute have developed a novel technique to measure neural activity in the brain by partitioning the activity into units of information. The study, published in PLoS Computational Biology, demonstrates how telecommunication systems can be modeled to study information flow in the brain networks. Read the Globe and Mail story.

Tapping onto early language acquisition processes may help people with dense amnesia: study

Scientists Asaf Gilboa and Morris Moscovitch from Baycrest’s Rotman Research Institute, University of Toronto, and Tali Sharon from Haifa University, utilized "fast mapping" with patients with dense amnesia to help them learn novel names of fruits and animals such as mangosteen and numbat.

The study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS), contradicts current models of brain systems, which suggest the hippocampus is always required for acquiring new information. Although preliminary, the study may help devise novel behavioral interventions for people with memory impairments.