A new study reveals the existence of brain cells whose role is primary and real-time filtering of nerve inputs from each of our senses. This filtering allows the brain to focus on the parameters that are "interesting" to it, thus saving itself considerable processing resources.
A new study reveals the existence of brain cells whose role is primary and real-time filtering of nerve inputs from each of our senses. This filtering allows the brain to focus on the parameters that are "interesting" to it, thus saving itself considerable processing resources. In an article in the journal PNAS, researchers from the USA present a series of experiments in which monkeys were shown series of drawings while monitoring their brain activity. The researchers saw that in order to remember what was presented to them, the monkeys simplified the level of complexity of the image into general categories of "people", "buildings", "plants", etc. The cells where increased activity was observed were in an area of the brain called the hippocampus, the area where memories are formed. Also, for different categories, different cells were activated. It was also observed that different monkeys made different categorizations for the same picture, so that a picture of a person eating a banana could be labeled under "people", "fruits" or "colors". The researchers also claim that this oversimplification may also lead to cases of misidentification.
