Members of the Brecht Lab

Joined February 2017
7 Photos and videos
28 Jul 2023
Happy to share our latest study on tickling and play responses in the brain that is out now in @NeuroCellPress! @nataliegloveli @misnaej
Researchers tickle rats to identify the part of the brain critical for laughter and playfulness. @HumboldtUni Michael Brecht Below see four ways that rats played with humans or each other in the study.
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Thick, immobile whiskers on an elephant’s trunk may help them to feel and balance objects even though they cannot twitch in the way that many other mammals’ whiskers do, according to a study published in @CommsBio. go.nature.com/3OX8sjL
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proud to present our latest study on Pang Pha, an elephant at the @zooberlin that very skillfully peels bananas. came out today @CurrentBiology and you can read it here: doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2023.0… 1/

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23 Feb 2023
Sorry, now link works: Your friends are like family to you! But how does your brain see this? We’re conducting a (paid) fMRI study in Berlin to investigate where family and friendship are represented in the brain. Fill out this short survey soscisurvey.de/test279257/ to take part.

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10 Jan 2023
We published a histological study on elephant trigeminal nervous subsystem last year. On its one-year anniversary, we @BrechtLab present to you doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.1… (0/n)🥳

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This is going to be great, I am so much looking forward to it! If you are in Amsterdam next week (January 16th) and want to attend this symposium on the Neuroscience of Social Behaviour, send me a message and I can forward details.
We will be presenting our research on ticklishness and playfulness at the social neuroscience symposium next Monday at the University of Amsterdam. Our fellow presenters include @SarahDagher7, @sbl_nin, and @lena_v_kaufmann. Hosted by @MarliesOostland.
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15 Nov 2022
RT @neuroetho: Really happy to talk about play on such a big platform @SfNtweets . Big shoutout to @BrechtLab @Kon_Hart @AnnikaReinhold @mi…
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14 Nov 2022
We had a very successful morning poster session at #SfN2022 with @lena_v_kaufmann presenting on elephant facial motor control, come check out our afternoon session as well (details below).
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14 Nov 2022
And we are already set up for the afternoon session at #SfN2022, Elçin Tunçkol will be presenting a poster on fiber counts and architecture of the human dorsal penile nerve, come over and check it out!
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28 Oct 2022
Proud to present our latest results by @lena_v_kaufmann et al. on the exceptional elephant facial motor nucleus, which shows adaptations to the development of the trunk and differences between African and Asian elephants 🐘
A new study reveals that elephants have an exceptionally high number of facial neurons—perhaps the most known to any land-dwelling mammal—and scientists are theorizing why. scim.ag/kO
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New "Science Advances" paper @BrechtLab. Trunk dexterity explained: Berlin scientists decipher facial motor control in elephants and show that the facial motor nucleus contains more facial motor neurons than in any other terrestrial mammal. science.org/doi/10.1126/scia…
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That's a wrap on #NeNa2022! Thanks to @BrechtLab , @lena_veit, all attendees and presenters for bringing (#Tübingen) junior #neuroscience together for the 23rd time!
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The more ticklish you feel, the faster and at a higher pitch you laugh. When being tickled, the best way to reduce ticklishness is to tickle yourself at the same spot: a rat study proved in humans. Fig. 1 is the 3rd author’s ticklish face. doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2021.01…
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You might know that we have a map of our body in the brain, but did you know that the pigs snout representation even looks like the pig snout? 🐽🧠🐷 New study out by the BrechtLab. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/… @bccn_berlin

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Winter is coming.. and for shrews, this means their brains will shrink. literally. Find this exciting story here: doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1922888… @ray_neuro @dehnelseffect @bccn_berlin

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17 Nov 2020
New paper out! The Vocal pattern generator in the brainstem of the rat seems to consist of two parts, functionally and anatomically distinct. @iScience @Kon_Hart @bccn_berlin cell.com/iscience/fulltext/S…

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did I spend way too much time coming up with a figure for this review? yes. would I do it all over again? also yes :) read it here! osf.io/y5fbq/
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Playing Hide and Seek with Rats! Published in Science with @neuroetho @BrechtLab science.sciencemag.org/conte…

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Looking for transgenic mouse experts 🔍🦠
Has anyone looked at the expression of flex-GCaMP in Cre-mice that are also crossed to Ai9 (or other) drive lines? Looking for help!
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