A New Way to Understand the Brain's Intricate Rhythm

Today, when researchers spend long hours in the lab performing tricky experiments, they might listen to music or podcasts to get them through the day. But in the early years of neuroscience, hearing was an essential part of the process. To figure out what neurons cared about, researchers would translate the near-instantaneous signals they send, called "spikes," into sound. The louder the sound, the more often the neuron was spiking--and the higher its firing rate. "You can just hear how many pops are coming out of the speaker, and if it's really loud or really quiet," says Joshua Jacobs, associate professor of biomedical engineering at Columbia University.