Neuroscience & Neurology | By July 29, 2007 | By Sudip Ghosh, MDcloseSudip Ghosh, MD Name: Sudip Ghosh
Site: http://brainblogger.com
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About: Dr. Ghosh is a surgeon at the University of Manchester, UK and a medical writer. | 3 Comments

Ah, Looks Familiar! Deja Vu and the Dentate Gyrus

The human brain recognizes “patterns” as a natural way of looking at places and things. The feeling of deja vu is the result of such a pattern match; although we might not actually have been in a similar situation, the brain thinks it has, and produces a feeling of familiarity.

New research published online in Science reveals that specific neuronal pathways in the learning and memory center of our brain, the hippocampus, is crucial for rapidly “comparing” two scenarios based on visual cues, thus identifying similar contexts. In turn, this can lead to the feeling of familiarity we often get in odd places and circumstances, termed deja vu. Read more →