MIT postdoc Emile Bruneau has long been drawn to conflict — not as a participant, but an observer. In 1994, while doing volunteer work in South Africa, he witnessed firsthand the turmoil surrounding the fall of apartheid; during a 2001 trip to visit friends in Sri Lanka, he found himself in the midst of the violent conflict between the Tamil Tigers and the Sri Lankan military.
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Transcriptional barcoding of retinal cells identifies disease target cells
(Medical Xpress) — By developing a large scale gene expression map for retinal cell types, FMI Neurobiologists have been able to identify the cells in the retina, where the genes causing retinal diseases specifically act. This narrows down the search for a better understanding of the diseases and opens up new avenues for therapeutic approaches.
Group settings can diminish expressions of intelligence, especially among women
In the classic film “12 Angry Men,” Henry Fonda’s character sways a jury with his quiet, persistent intelligence. But would he have succeeded if he had allowed himself to fall sway to the social dynamics of that jury?
The price of your soul: How the brain decides whether to ‘sell out’
An Emory University neuro-imaging study shows that personal values that people refuse to disavow, even when offered cash to do so, are processed differently in the brain than those values that are willingly sold.
Scientists keep their eyes on peripheral vision
(Medical Xpress) — Two USC scientists are bringing peripheral vision into focus, showing that the way the brain sharpens its attention while the eyes are in motion leads to false assumptions about how objects should look.