Earlier this month, the World Economic Forum published its annual report on global risks, “Global Risks 2013: Eighth Edition.” At the 2013 WEF meeting at Davos, a session focused on emerging threats, called “X Factors: Preparing for the Unknown.” My colleague Philip Campbell, the editor in chief of Nature, and his colleague editors, identified these [...]

What if a drug could improve learning and cognition and had no untoward medical consequences? Wouldn’t it be justified to make it widely available? A group of scientists concluded three years ago that it would be. No such drug exists, but the question arises anew because of a brain-stimulation technique that appears on paper to [...]

On Monday, I put up a post on whether we would ever be able to upload our brains into a computer, merging ourselves into the great digital Singularity that would provide us with eternal life—and virtually infinite sensory powers and intelligence. The take home: This is akin to a cargo cult-like religion. Don’t hold your [...]

Many studies have linked exercise with improved brain health later in life. Now a new controlled trial reveals more about how aerobic activity might be helping to bolster the brain by beefing up the hippocampus. As we age, parts of the brain tend to shrink—even in the absence of neurocognitive diseases, such as dementia or [...]

A light electrical current just above the right ear seems to improve numerical learning for at least six months, according to a new study. But if the current is moved to the left side, average peoples’ ability to learn basic numerical principles plummets. The group behind the new study, led by Roi Cohen Kadosh, a [...]