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Friday, September 26, 2008, 07:00 PM: Truthiness and Agnotology

Does the massive increase in communications, brought about by cable and satellite television, and, especially, the internet, help us find truth? Or does it help spread doubt, confusion, lies, mythology, crackpot conspiracy theories, and the like? As internet bandwidth continues its upward spiral into the future, what should we expect in the future?

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Memory

Learning During Sleep? Researchers Investigate Communication Between Memory Areas

New information is transferred between the hippocampus, the short term memory area, and the cerebral cortex during sleep. Contrary to previous assumptions, the cerebral cortex actively controls this transfer.

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Getting to the bottom of memory

Researchers investigate the molecular basis of memory in living mice. The study identified a molecule that is crucially involved in learning and singled out the signaling pathway through which it affects memory. Our sense organs inform our brain about what happens around us and brain cells communicate this information between each other using electrical signals. These signals become stronger the more often a cell experiences the same stimulus, allowing it to distinguish familiar information from news. In other words, a cell remembers an event as an unusually strong and long-lasting signal. This phenomenon called long-term potentiation [LTP] is thought to underpin learning and memory and its molecular basis is being investigated intensively.

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(C) 2007 Boulder Future Salon and the Acceleration Studies Foundation.