Brain Matters the Podcast

This is a terrific idea. We did it once for the David McCormick episode on our website, but I will try to make it a habit.

Hey Milo - Thanks for listening. I’d be happy to give you some advice on how we got started. Shoot me an email at [email protected] and I can hopefully provide some help.

On this (50th!) episode of Brain Matters, Anthony talks to Dr. Fred Wolf (Assistant Professor, UC Merced). Dr. Wolf is interested in how alcohol and other drugs of abuse change our genes when we take them. Using the fruit fly as a model organism, he is able to use powerful techniques to delve into the complex relationship between drugs, genes, and behavior.

Dr. Wolf helps run his own biology podcast, RadioBio, with graduate students at UC Merced.

The music on today's podcast was by koleżanka.

Episode 48 - Space and Time with Dr. Mayank Mehta

On this episode of Brain Matters, Matt and Mayank Mehta (Professor, UCLA) talk about how rodents and human perceive space and time. Mayank has always been obsessed with time and merges physics and neuroscience to understand how the brain deals with these abstract concepts.

This episode was brought to you by Maze Engineers. Get 10% off your quote by visiting mazeengineers.com/brainmatters and enter the offer code: brain. They have some incredible behavioral neuroscience mazes and other neuroscience goodies so check them out.

Music on today’s episode by Equip and Sangam. Both are artists on the Dream Catalogue label

We know our listeners wanted to see David McCormick’s dog Sasha Pup up close and personal. Here is enough cuteness and fluff to last a while.

You can hear David talk about his dog on the podcast.

Don’t miss pictures of the young André Fenton in this PBS video. André talked about this frog eye experiment on the podcast too!

Episode 47 - Becoming A Curious Scientist with Dr. André Fenton

What’s the most important thing about being a scientist? According to Dr. André Fenton: Curiosity. Anthony and André talked about how André tinkered his way to researching learning and memory at NYU.

André mentioned this famous article by Jerry Lettvin - What the Frog’s Eye Tells the Frog’s Brain

Here’s an article about the interesting story of PKMzeta, a molecule André has been studying for over a decade.

Music on today’s episode by Sure

Cool brain stuff from the McCormick Lab: LFP, multiunit, and intracellular recordings of slow oscillations in vivo.

Episode 46 - The Nature of Nature (and the brain too) with Dr. David McCormick

This week on Brain Matters, Matt and Dr. David McCormick (Professor of Neuroscience and Psychology, Yale) start off 2017 right. On this episode you’ll get a quick briefing on the early history of neuroscience, information about Frankenstein’s monster, a look at neural circuits, and perspective from the Buddhist Monks of Tibet. You’re gonna want your cochleas ready for this one. 

David mentioned a ton of people and books. Here’s a list in case you wanna dive in.

Major Figures in the Early History of Neuroscience: Luigi Galvani, Giovanni Aldini, René Descartes, Jan Swammerdam, Alessandro Volta, Emil de Bois-Reymond

Texts David Referenced: 1. Animal Electricity (Galvani, 1791) 2. Essay on Galvanism: “Précis des expériences galvaniques faites récemment à Londres et à Calais“ (Aldini, 1803) 3. Frankenstein (Mary Shelley, 1818) 4. The Cerebellum as a Neuronal Machine (Eccles, 1967)

 Further Reading (if you’re into it like we are): 1. Early History of Neuroscience, Charles Gross 2. Giovanni Aldini: From Animal Electricity to Human Brain Stimulation, André Parent 3. History of Psychology, Ideas and Context (Chapter 8) King et al.

We partnered with Wiley Neuroscience on this one. Follow them on twitter! Shout out to their team for getting the twitter handle coveted most by neuroscientists.

The music on this episode was by Noveller. The first track was “Trails and Trials” from the soon to be released album “A Pink Sunset for Noone”, the second track was “Rubicon” from the Fantastic Planet LP. Go check out and purchase her music on bandcamp, or at her current label, Fire Records.

Episode 45 - Engineering the Brain with Dr. Caleb Kemere

On this episode of Brain Matters, Anthony and Caleb Kemere (Assistant Professor, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University) talk about Caleb's path to studying real time neural engineering.

Music on today’s episode by Jefre Cantu-Ledesma

Intercepting Neurological Triggers of Alzheimer’s Disease

Episode 44 - Neurons, Mitochondria, and Human Evolution with Dr. Franck Polleux

On this episode of Brain Matters, Matt and Dr. Franck Polleux (Professor, Department of Neuroscience at Columbia University and the Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute) cover a lot of ground. Franck talks about his work as a graduate student and the topics his lab is working on now. The Polleux lab is studying topics like neural progeneration, mitochondria in dendrites of neurons, and what makes the human brain special. This is an episode you won't want to miss.

Music on today’s episode by Jefre Cantu-Ledesma

 #ThrowbackThursday to Brain Matters guest Shawn Lockery! Who doesn’t love nematodes and neuroscience?

On the new episode of  Brain Matters, Tod Thiele talks about his research on sensorimotor circuits in zebrafish. Tod uses techniques like calcium imaging and optogenetics to understand the zebrafish brain.