From Our Neurons to Yours
From Our Neurons to Yours crisscrosses scientific disciplines to bring you to the frontiers of brain science. Coming to you from the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University, we ask leading scientists to help us understand the three pounds of matter within our skulls and how new discoveries, treatments, and technologies are transforming our relationship with the brain.
Finalist for 2024 Signal Awards!
Episodes
49 episodes
How to live in a world without free will | Robert Sapolsky
Today, we are speaking with the one and only Robert Sapolsky, a Stanford neurobiologist, a MacArthur "Genius", and best-selling author of books exploring the nature of stress, social behavior, and — as he puts it — "the biology of the human pre...
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Season 6
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Episode 7
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40:46
The power of psychedelics meets the power of placebo: ketamine, opioids, and hope in depression treatment | Boris Heifets & Theresa Lii
Join us as we dive back into the world of psychedelic medicine with anesthesiologists Boris Heifets and Theresa Lii, who share intriguing new data that sheds light on how ketamine and placebo effects may interact in treating depression.W...
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Season 6
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Episode 6
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35:10
Seeing sounds, tasting colors: the science of synaesthesia with David Eagleman (re-release)
Today, we are going back into the archives for one of my favorite episodes: We are talking to neuroscientist, entrepreneur, and best-selling author, David Eagleman. We're talking about synaesthesia — and if you don't know what that is, y...
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Season 6
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Episode 5
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21:52
The BRAIN Initiative: the national vision for the future of neuroscience is now in doubt | Bill Newsome
Earlier this year, President Obama's signature BRAIN Initiative, which has powered advances in neuroscience for the past 10 years, had its budget slashed by 40%. Over the past decade, the BRAIN Initiative made roughly $4 bil...
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Season 6
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Episode 4
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39:23
The cannabinoids within: how marijuana hijacks an ancient signaling system in the brain | Ivan Soltesz
Given the widespread legalization of cannabis for medical and recreational uses, you'd think we'd have a better understanding of how it works. But ask a neuroscientist exactly how cannabinoid compounds like THC and CBD alter our percepti...
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Season 6
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Episode 3
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37:33
Memory Palaces: the science of mental time travel and the brain's GPS system | Lisa Giocomo (Re-release)
Today we are re-releasing an episode we did last year with Stanford neurobiologist Lisa Giocomo exploring the intersection of memory, navigation and the boundaries we create between ourselves and the world around us.This episode ...
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Season 6
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Episode 2
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25:50
Why new Alzheimer's drugs don't work | Mike Greicius, Stanford University School of Medicine
In the past few years, Big Pharma has released not one, but three new treatments for Alzheimer’s disease. Aducanemab (2021), Lecanemab (2023), and Donanemab (2024), are the first treatments to effectively clear the brain of amylo...
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Season 6
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Episode 1
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25:48
Depression's distinctive fingerprints in the brain | Leanne Williams, Stanford University
Getting help for depression can be like purgatory. Setting aside for a moment the stigma and other barriers to seeking treatment in the first place, finding the right combination of medication and/or therapy can be a months- or years-lon...
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Season 5
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Episode 6
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28:11
How the brain helps cancers grow | Michelle Monje
Today, we're talking with Stanford neuro-oncologist, Michelle Monje. This is actually the third time we've had Michelle on the show, in part because she's been a pioneer of three exciting fr...
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Season 5
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Episode 5
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21:27
Unraveling Timothy Syndrome: the new science of human brain development | Sergiu Pasca
This week on From Our Neurons to Yours, we're talking about using new techniques for growing human brain tissue in the lab to solve a rare neurological disorder.Host Nicholas Weiler sits down with Sergiu Pasca an innovative Stanf...
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Season 5
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Episode 4
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30:31
How VR could help treat depression with "radical behaviorist" Dr. Kim Bullock
Today, we're going to talk about virtual reality and how it could be used to treat depression. We're talking with psychiatrist Kim Bullock, the founding director of Stanford...
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Season 5
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Episode 3
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21:36
Electronic skin and the future of wearable technology | Zhenan Bao
The skin is full of contradictions. It’s soft and sensitive, but also tough and resilient, even self-healing. It’s both the barrier that protects us from infections and our most intimate connection with the outside world.
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Season 5
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Episode 2
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23:35
How a new kind of brain plasticity could help make sense of addiction | Michelle Monje and Rob Malenka
This week, we're diving into recent research that sheds light on a new form of brain plasticity involving changes in the insulation of nerve fibers — called myelin. It turns out that myelin plasticity is implicated in a number of s...
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Season 5
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Episode 1
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22:54
Our plastic brains: learning, memory and aging with the one and only Carla Shatz (Rerelease)
-- We're re-releasing our conversation with Carla Shatz, one of our favorites from the archive, which comes up all the time on the show in the context of brain plasticity and aging. Enjoy, and see you next time! -NW -- When we'r...
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Season 4
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Episode 6
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21:56
Programming Announcement
Hi everyone — quick programming announcement. As we head into summer, we'll be moving to an every-other-week cadence as we prepare more conversations from the frontiers of neuroscience. I'm very excited about what we're working on for you, so s...
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0:25
Neuroscience and AI: What artificial intelligence teaches us about the brain (and vice versa) | Surya Ganguli
The powerful new generation of AI tools that has come out over the past few years — DALL-E, ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and the rest — have blown away our old ideas about what AI can do and raised questions about what it means for compute...
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Season 4
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Episode 5
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27:38
How we remember, why we forget | Anthony Wagner
At some point in our lives, we all struggle with memory — learning a new name, remembering that book you were reading just yesterday or that word on the tip of your tongue. So what can neuroscience teach us about why we remember,...
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Season 4
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Episode 4
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29:00
Psychedelics Part 2: How do drugs alter our perceptions? | Boris Heifets
Today, we're going to talk about how psychedelics alter our perception of reality and what that says about... reality! Welcome to part two of our conversation with Stanford anesthesiologist and psychedelics researcher
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Season 4
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Episode 3
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23:36
Psychedelics, placebo, and anesthetic dreams | Boris Heifets (part 1)
Psychedelics are a hot topic in psychiatry today. They’re producing dramatic reversals for patients with severe depression, PTSD, and other mental health conditions. But scientists still have fundamental questions about why
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Season 4
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Episode 2
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30:27
Why our brains are bad at climate change | Nik Sawe
This week on From Our Neurons to Yours, we're talking about the neuroscience of climate change with neuroeconomist Nik Sawe.If you follow the science or the news, you know how big of a risk climate change is. Storms, coastal floo...
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Season 4
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Episode 1
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23:42
Famous & Gravy: Mind Traveler | Oliver Sacks
This week we’re doing something a little different. My good friend Michael Osborne, who produces this show also has his own podcast, called Famous & Gravy – Life Lessons from Dead Celebrit...
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Season 3
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Episode 7
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59:43
The clocks in your body | Tony Wyss-Coray
Today: the clocks in your body.We're talking again this week with Tony Wyss-Coray, the director of the Knight Initiative for Brain Resilience here at Wu Tsai Neuro. Last year, we spoke with Tony about the biological n...
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Season 3
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Episode 6
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22:07
Redefining Parkinson's Disease | Kathleen Poston
Today on the show, a new understanding of Parkinson's disease. Parkinson's disease is one of the most common neurodegenerative disorders — right after Alzheimer's disease. It's familiar to many as a movement disorder: people with...
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Season 3
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Episode 5
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24:28
Space and Memory | Lisa Giocomo
This week on From Our Neurons to Yours, we sit down with Stanford neurobiologist Lisa Giocomo to explore the intersection of memory and navigation. This episode was inspired by the idea of memory palaces. The idea is simple: Take...
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Season 3
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Episode 4
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25:12
OCD & Ketamine | Carolyn Rodriguez
In this episode of "From Our Neurons to Yours," we're taking a deep dive into the neuroscience of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and the recent discovery that the anesthetic ketamine can give patients a week-long "vacation" from the disord...
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Season 3
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Episode 3
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22:41