A new Cambridge study found that our brains remain active all the time

According to a new study by researchers at the University of Cambridge found that our brains are never at rest, even when we are not learning anything about the world around us. The research was earlier conducted on mice.

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Key-Points

The new research shows that memories of specific events and experiences may never settle down. Instead, the activity patterns that store information can continually change, even when we are not learning anything new.

The University of Cambridge, Harvard Medical School and Stanford University study reveals how the brain can reliably access stored information despite drastic changes in the brain signals that represent it.

The study, published in the open-access journal ‘eLife’, provides some of the first evidence that constant changes in neural activity are compatible with long-term memories of learned skills.

The researchers came to this conclusion through modelling and analysis of data taken from an experiment in which mice were trained to associate a visual cue at the start of a 4.5-metre-long virtual reality maze with turning left or right at a T-junction, before navigating to a reward.

The experimental data consisted of activity patterns from hundreds of nerve cells recorded simultaneously in a part of the brain that controls and plans movement, recorded at a resolution that is not yet possible in humans.