Dr. Michael Merzenich: To harness Neuroplasticity for cognitive enhancement, we need to think “Fitness” more than “Games”

(Edi­tor’s Note: In order to help read­ers famil­iar­ize them­selves with the work and think­ing of Dr. Michael Merzenich, one of the win­ners of the 2016 Kavli Prize in Neu­ro­science for ground­break­ing work on neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty, we are con­dens­ing and repub­lish­ing the com­pre­hen­sive con­ver­sa­tion that Dr. Merzenich and Alvaro Fer­nan­dez had in 2009, in prepa­ra­tion for the inaugural…

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Three neuroscientists win $1 million Kavli Prize for discovering brain’s plasticity

——- Three neu­ro­sci­en­tists win $1m award for dis­cov­er­ing brain’s plas­tic­i­ty (STAT): “Three neu­ro­sci­en­tists whose research over­turned decades-old notions about how and whether the brain can change in response to expe­ri­ence have won a $1 mil­lion Kavli Prize in Neu­ro­science, the Nor­we­gian Acad­e­my of Sci­ence and Let­ters announced on Thursday.

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Trend: Nestle launches Wellness Club in Japan integrating Nutritionists and Brain Trainers

Match made in nutri­tion­al heav­en: Nestlé launch­es Well­ness Club (press release): ‘Nestlé Japan has launched the company’s first per­son­alised health sup­port ser­vice. Nestlé Well­ness Club pro­vides sub­scribers with nutri­tion­al sup­port based on data about their phys­i­cal activ­i­ty, dietary infor­ma­tion and brain train­ing scores, 

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Update: ¿Habla Español? Know someone who’d enjoy a great brain book in Spanish?

Time for Sharp­Brains’ Feb­ru­ary e‑Newsletter, this time fea­tur­ing the glob­al launch of our new book, in Span­ish, Cómo inver­tir en su cere­bro: Una guía Sharp­Brains para mejo­rar su mente y su vida, avail­able already as a soft-cov­­er and e‑book! –> If you speak Span­ish, please get a copy for your­self. Tam­bién puede ver el video de la char­la de…

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Michael Merzenich on Brain Training, Assessments, and Personal Brain Trainers

Inter­view with Dr. Michael Merzenich, Emer­i­tus Pro­fes­sor at UCSF, a lead­ing pio­neer in brain plas­tic­i­ty research. In the late 1980s, Dr. Merzenich was on the team that invent­ed the cochlear implant. In 1996, he was the found­ing CEO of Sci­en­tif­ic Learn­ing Cor­po­ra­tion (Nas­daq: SCIL), and in 2004 became co-founder and Chief Sci­en­tif­ic Offi­cer of Posit Sci­ence. He was elect­ed to the Nation­al Acad­e­my of Sci­ences in 1999 and to the Insti­tute of Med­i­cine this year. He retired as Fran­cis A. Sooy Pro­fes­sor and Co-Direc­tor of the Keck Cen­ter for Inte­gra­tive Neu­ro­science at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia at San Fran­cis­co in 2007. You may have learned about his work in one of PBS TV spe­cials, mul­ti­ple media appear­ances, or neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty-relat­ed books.

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