Researchers participating in a AAAS Annual Meeting news briefing discuss how the use of brain tissue from living donors has prompted a paradigm shift in the study and understanding of the human brain.

Therapies that target these proteins could help clear toxic plaques in patients with the disease, researchers say.

Combining the use of light and genetics to control the behavior of cells in living tissue, optogenetics may lead to a more precise understanding of the brain's hugely complex neural network.