neuropharmacology

Nature, Published online: 21 August 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-02626-x Nature staff discuss how an FDA-approved drug for narcolepsy could have promise beyond the condition, and the longest-lived human brain organoids yet.

Childhood adversity might alter how the brain responds to social hormones. A study in Translational Psychiatry suggests oxytocin temporarily increases altruism in adults with difficult childhoods, but decreases generosity in those with fewer adverse early experiences.

Neuropsychopharmacology, Published online: 19 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41386-026-02529-5 Glucocorticoid–endocannabinoid crosstalk in the ventrolateral periaqueductal gray (vlPAG) promotes pain resolution

ObjectiveTo systematically characterize the intensity-dependent effects of low-intensity transcranial ultrasound stimulation (TUS) on excitability in the human primary motor cortex (M1) and to identify an effective intensity threshold for inducing immediate excitatory changes.MethodsIn a randomized, double-blind, sham-controlled crossover design, twenty-five healthy right-handed adults (mean age,…

🧠 JOIN THE GIANT’S SHOULDER FAMILY Become a YouTube Member for exclusive episodes, early access + ad-free viewing 👇 / @thegiantsshoulder. Deborah Mash is a neuropharmacologist who holds the first FDA licence ever granted to give ibogaine to a human being, built one of America’s largest brain banks, and discovered noribogaine — the metabolite now […]

A new theory from neuroscientists at MIT’s Picower Institute proposes that cognition and consciousness may depend not only on neurons and synaptic connections, but also on the traveling electrical waves generated by neural activity. The traditional “brain as circuitry” analogy captures an important part of neuroscience: synaptic connections store and transmit information. But Earl Miller […]

Enterprises could cut GPU use and power costs as the open-source bundle lets Akida neuromorphic chips share IBM's scheduler for inference tasks.

Stroke recovery is increasingly understood as a process shaped by disrupted interactions among motor intention, descending motor output, peripheral movement, and sensory feedback, rather than by motor weakness alone. After stroke, residual motor intention may not be effectively translated into spinal motor output, peripheral movement may be too limited to provide sufficient sensory feedback, and …

You heard me right, this isn't some SciFi or a new movie script, it's real. Actual Neurons cultivated in labs, wired into computing systems. Though my first question is... does this mean we are a bit closer to AGI? A future where machines don't simply just calculate but think? So what is this even? It's Bio-computing. And what is Bio-computing? It's using living neurons as processors instead of y…

BackgroundDiabetic neuropathic pain (DNP) is a disabling complication of diabetes mellitus and is closely associated with impaired inhibitory neurotransmission and neuroimmune activation. Although GABAergic dysfunction has been implicated in neuropathic pain, the relationship between peripheral transcriptomic signatures, central transcriptional alterations, and the therapeutic effects of GABA rec…

Nature Communications, Published online: 20 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41467-026-76837-1 Here authors show patient-derived neural models of childhood dementia exhibit key disease features. A drug screening platform integrating machine learning, imaging, transcriptomics and electrophysiology, identifies repurposed compounds that mitigate adverse effects.

Science has done many things that seem miraculous. Why not transfer your consciousness to a machine?

Brains scans show a signature linked to a dissolved separation between the self and the world.

Nature, Published online: 19 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10910-z The psychedelic psilocybin reorganizes brain activity into structured, context-aligned patterns that integrate internal and external processing, providing a neural basis for the felt continuity between self and world, elucidating how the psychedelic state translates into psychological change.

Addiction researchers believe the brain changes that occur during abstinence may increase a person’s risk of relapse

A professor proposes that behavior emerges through continuous interactions among sensory, sensorimotor, and motor processes rather than a dedicated decision-making mechanism. There may be a gap between how people believe decisions are made and what actually happens inside the brain, according to Indiana University professor Tom James. For decades, both scientific theories and everyday thinking [.…