____________________________________________________________
Welcome to the Neuroscience for Kids Newsletter.
In this issue:
____________________________________________________________
Neuroscience for Kids had several new additions in November including:
A. November Neuroscience for Kids Newsletter was archived
http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/news2511.html
B. New Neuroscience in the News
http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/inthenews.html
C. Visit or follow my Instagram site with neuroscience facts and trivia:
https://www.instagram.com/ericchudler/
D. Smell and the COVID-19 Pandemic
https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/covid19.html
__________________________________________________________
The Neuroscience for Kids "Site of the Month" for Decemmber is "The Brain Domain" at:
https://thebraindomain.org/about
Neuroscientists at Cardiff University have created "The Brain Domain" to help scientists and non-scientists understand neuroscientific research. The site gives young neuroscientists the opportunity to publish articles that helps these early-career scientists develop scientific writing and communication skills.
The Brain Domain divides their articles into three types: a) Research articles that describe new neuroscientific findings, b) Discussion articles about how neuroscience impacts the real world and c) Reflection articles that share personal experiences about mental health or neurological disease. The articles cover a wide-range of topics and I am sure you will find the material most interesting.
__________________________________________________________
There is still time to enter the 2022 Neuroscience for Kids Poetry Contest is now open! Use your imagination to create a poem about the brain. For complete rules and an entry form, go to:
http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/contest22.html
Entries must be received by February 1, 2022.
__________________________________________________________
Here is a new experiment to test your sense of touch and explore how different parts of your body are more sensitive than other parts of your body.
Draw a shape or design on a piece of paper. Give a test subject a blank piece of paper and a pencil or pen. Place the paper with your design on your test subject's back. Tell your subject that you are going to draw a shape on the paper that is on their back and that they should draw what they feel on their paper. Using a pencil eraser or other blunt object, outline your shape that is on your paper that is on your subject's back. Ask your subjects to draw the shape that they feel on their back. Do not move the paper as you are outlining the shape. When you are finished drawing your shape, compare your original drawing with the drawing that your subject made.
Try the experiment with different patterns. Also, try the experiment by outlining your drawing on other parts of your subject's body (e.g., hands, legs). Don't let your subjects see the design when you are doing your outline. Also, try simple and more complex shapes.
For more information about the sense of touch and to help you understand the results of this experiment, see:
http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/twopt.html
__________________________________________________________
Read about how Neuroscience for Kids got started in my article titled "Teaching neuroscience one potato chip at a time," in The MindBrainEd Think Tank+, 7:7-10, 2021. Online at:
https://www.mindbrained.org/2021/11/teaching-neuroscience-one-potato-chip-at-a-time/
__________________________________________________________
Get you FREE “Show us your BRAINs” 2022 yearly calendar at:
https://catalog.ninds.nih.gov/publications/2022-brain-initiative-calendarWhen you receive your brainy calendar, turn to the month of June to see my photo that was selected for the calendar.
__________________________________________________________
A. "Thoughts from a Brain Collector." (DISCOVER, November/December, 2021).
B. The cover story of the November 2021 issue of BBC SCIENCE FOCUS is titled "Your Mysterious Brain."
_________________________________________________________
A. In 2014, hallucinogenic mushrooms (Amanita muscaria) were discovered growing around Buckingham Palace in London.
B. Between about 1930 to 1950, table tennis was banned in the Soviet Union because the sport was thought to be harmful for the eyes (Source: The Olympics Factbook: A Spectator's Guide to the Summer Games, edited by Rebecca Nelson and Marie J. MacNee, Detroit (MI): Visible Ink Press, 1996).
C. The brain of the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) has about 100,000 neurons (Source: Zheng, Z., A complete electron microscopy volume of the brain of adult Drosophila melanogaster, Cell, 174:730-743, 2018).
D. Horses sleep a little less than 3 hours each day (Source: Lesku, J.A., et al., Phylogenetics and the correlates of mammalian sleep: A reappraisal, Sleep Medicine Reviews, 12:229-244, 2008).
E. Parkinson's disease is named after English physician James Parkinson (born, 1755; died; 1824) who described the symptoms of this neurological disease in "An Essay on the Shaking Palsy" (1817).
_________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________
Some people change their email addresses at the end of the year to reduce the amount of unwanted messages. If you will be changing your email address and would like to continue to receive the Neuroscience for Kids newsletter, please send me your new email address (chudler@u.washington.edu).
_________________________________________________________
To remove yourself from this mailing list and stop your subscription
to the Neuroscience for Kids Newsletter, send e-mail to Dr. Eric H.
Chudler at: chudler@u.washington.edu
_________________________________________________________
Your comments and suggestions about this newsletter and the "Neuroscience for Kids" web site are always welcome. If there are any special topics that you would like to see on the web site, just let me know.
Eric
Eric H. Chudler, Ph.D.