Understanding the Brain

Latest episodes

• How the Brain Adapts to Antidepressants: Receptors, Circuits, and Neuroplasticity

  October 12, 2026 · 4 min

  Antidepressants influence neurotransmission relatively quickly, yet meaningful clinical improvement often takes longer. This episode explores receptor signaling, neural adaptation, stress circuitry, and neuroplasticity in depression…

• Psychosis From the Immune System: The Strange Case of Anti-NMDA Receptor Encephalitis

  October 11, 2026 · 3 min

  Imagine developing what appears to be schizophrenia almost overnight, only for doctors to discover that your immune system may be attacking receptors in your brain. Anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis provides one of medicine’s most remarkable…

• Four Roads for One Molecule: Mapping the Brain's Dopamine Pathways

  October 6, 2026 · 3 min

  Dopamine doesn't run on a single track — it moves through four distinct pathways in the brain, and each one produces a very different story when its activity shifts. This episode breaks down the mesolimbic, mesocortical, nigrostriatal, and…

• Dopamine Isn’t Simply the Pleasure Chemical

  October 4, 2026 · 3 min

  Dopamine is routinely described as the brain’s “pleasure chemical,” but that description leaves out much of the story. Dopamine systems participate in motivation, learning, movement and the prediction of rewards. Researchers have shown…

• Why You Can Feel Someone Watching You—Even When You Never Saw Them

  September 28, 2026 · 3 min

  Have you ever suddenly looked across a room and discovered that someone was staring directly at you? It can feel almost supernatural, as though your brain somehow detected another person’s attention before you consciously saw them. But the…

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