Biological neural networks as a research area focus on the structure, dynamics, and computation of networks of real neurons in living organisms, integrating cellular neurophysiology, synaptic plasticity, and systems-level circuit organization. The field investigates how biophysical properties, connectivity patterns, and neuromodulatory influences give rise to information processing, learning, memory, and behavior. It spans experimental and theoretical approaches, including electrophysiology, imaging, connectomics, computational modeling, and data-driven analysis of large-scale neural recordings, with the dual goals of explaining brain function mechanistically and providing biologically grounded principles that inform artificial neural network design and neuroengineering applications.
The brain does not need its sophisticated cortex to interpret the visual world. A new study published in PLOS Biology demonstrates that a much older structure, the superior colliculus, contains the necessary circuitry to ...
Evolution
Nov 5, 2025
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An international team of researchers, including scientists from the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, has uncovered a surprisingly complex nervous system in sea urchins. The animals appear to possess an "all-body brain" whose ...
Plants & Animals
Nov 5, 2025
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How do embryos develop? Why does the cortex of the mammalian brain fold? How do we feel touch at our fingertips? These and other fundamental biological questions remain unsolved. Yet, scientists know they all rely on a common ...
Cell & Microbiology
Oct 29, 2025
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What neural and behavioral mechanisms allow mice to identify food sources, navigate toward them, and initiate consumption? A research team led by Prof. Zhang Yunfeng from the Institute of Zoology of the Chinese Academy of ...
Plants & Animals
Oct 22, 2025
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Using simulations, robots, and live fish, scientists at EPFL and Duke University have replicated the neural circuitry that allows zebrafish to react to visual stimuli and maintain their position in flowing water. They provide ...
Plants & Animals
Oct 22, 2025
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Why do animals search for food at specific times of the day? In a study published in Current Biology, a research group led by Prof. Li Yan from the Institute of Biophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has uncovered ...
Plants & Animals
Oct 13, 2025
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When animals move together in flocks, herds, or schools, neural dynamics in their brain become synchronized through shared ways of representing space, a new study by researchers from the University of Konstanz (Germany) suggests. ...
Ecology
Oct 13, 2025
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Scientists at Monash University have created a tiny fluid-based chip that behaves like neural pathways of the brain, potentially opening the door to a new generation of computers.
Nanophysics
Oct 10, 2025
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What is the meaning of life? Even the best of us couldn't hope to answer that question in a Universe Today article. But there are those who would try to "constrain" it, at least in terms of physics. A new paper from Pankaj ...
Astronomy
Sep 24, 2025
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A team of scientists from the University of Cologne's Institute of Biochemistry has made a decisive discovery about the molecular basis of synapse formation in the central nervous system. They studied inhibitory synapses, ...
Molecular & Computational biology
Sep 19, 2025
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