Massachusetts Institute of Technology engineers are working to automate the process of recording electrical signals from a brain neuron, which could help researchers more precisely study individual brain cells that affect learning and functioning and cause cognitive diseases.
“Knowing how neurons communicate is fundamental to basic and clinical neuroscience,” Ed Boyden, senior author of the research paper and associate professor of biological engineering and brain and cognitive sciences, told MIT News. “Our hope is this technology will allow you to look at what’s happening inside a cell, in terms of neural computation, or in a disease state.”