Press releases

Do you remember the last time your mother called? Something like that, probably - it is often difficult for us to say the exact time when an event happened in the past. Jacob Bellmund and Christian Doeller from MPI CBS wanted to find out exactly how our brains estimate such times. They have now published their results in the journal Nature Communications, showing that psychologically constructed time shapes our memories.
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Evidence of structured vocal sequences in wild chimpanzee communication provides insights into human language evolution more

A natural disaster, a dented car, an injured person - memories of traumatic experiences can be controlled by deliberately suppressing the images that arise. Until now, however, it was unclear what happens to the memory in the process and how the process is reflected in the brain. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences (MPI CBS) have now shown: The memories of the experiences fade and their traces in the brain are less strongly reactivated when we try to remember them. more

A comprehensive map of the human brain is a long-held goal of neuroanatomists. Noninvasive imaging techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) do allow scientists to study the healthy living human brain. However, they provide only limited anatomical detail. A higher level of detail can be obtained by microscopy on the brains of deceased donors. But that, in turn, usually focuses on small brain structures imaged in 2D. Now, a team of scientists from the University of Amsterdam and the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences has combined MRI and microscopy. This has produced 3D images of two complete brains with an unprecedented level of detail.
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Persistent paralysis and coordination problems are among the most common consequences of a stroke. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig (MPI CBS), the University Medical Center Halle, and the Charité-Universitätsmedizin in Berlin have discovered that brain stimulation helps. Direct current, applied via electrodes attached to the head, led to significant improvement of patients’ impaired movements. In addition to showing pronounced effects after a single application, the study suggests that the therapy may need to be individually tailored to specific patients for optimal benefit.
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Offering doctoral students a first-class education and attracting the most brilliant minds from across the world — these are goals of the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences (MPI CBS) in Leipzig. In close cooperation with Leipzig University, the Institute is launching the International Max Planck Research School on Cognitive NeuroImaging (IMPRS CoNI) next year. The programme will give particularly talented students the opportunity to complete their doctorate in the field of "cognitive neuroscience" with a focus on imaging methods such as magnetic resonance imaging. What is special about this is that each doctoral student will follow an individually adapted training plan, through which each can further his or her education according to individual their professional needs.
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Year after year, carnival in Rio makes one thing perfectly clear: samba moves people. The pounding drums elicit exuberant movement and ecstatic displays of emotion. But what is it that makes this music so special? What is the secret of these mesmerizing drum groups? Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences (MPI CBS) and the D'OR Institute for Research and Education in Rio de Janeiro now believe it has to do with synchrony. Greater synchrony between beats of the drums leads to stronger emotion and greater activation of brain areas responsible for rhythm, movement, and prediction in listeners. more

The Max-Planck-Gesellschaft honours young scientists and researchers each year with the Otto Hahn Medal for outstanding scientific achievements. This year, Stephanie Theves and Matthias Nau from the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences (MPI CBS) won two of the coveted awards. more

Martin Hebart from the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences has been awarded one of the coveted 1.5 million euro grants from the European Research Council. Over the next five years the cognitive neuroscientist wants to determine which visual features our brains use to recognize objects. more

To find out what happens in the brain when humans experience emotions, researchers have so far mostly used highly simplified laboratory experiments. The emotions often bore little resemblance to what is experienced in everyday life. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences have now used virtual reality to evoke emotions as realistically as possible - and were able to calculate the strength of the emotion from the brain signals. more