Aging and Brain Plasticity | Carla Shatz

When we're kids, our brains are amazing at learning. We absorb information from the outside world with ease, and we can adapt to anything. But as we age, our brains become a little more fixed. Our brain circuits become a little less flexible.

You may have heard of a concept called neuroplasticity, our brain's ability to change or rewire itself. This is of course central to learning and memory, but it's also important for understanding a surprisingly wide array of medical conditions, including things like epilepsy, depression, even Alzheimer's disease.

Today's guest, Carla Shatz, is a pioneer in understanding how our brains are sculpted by our experiences. She's credited with coining the phrase neurons that fire together, wire together. Her work over the past 40 years is foundational to how we understand the brain today.

So I was excited to talk to Shatz about our brain's capacity for change, and I started off by asking about this sort of simple question, why exactly do we have this learning superpower as kids to do things like pick up languages and why does it go away?

Shatz is Sapp Family Provostial Professor of Biology and of Neurobiology and the Catherine Holman Johnson director of Stanford Bio-X.

Learn More

• In conversation with Carla Shatz (Nature Neuroscience)
• Carla Shatz, her breakthrough discovery in vision and the developing brain (Stanford Medicine Magazine)
• Making an Old Brain Young | Carla Shatz (TEDxStanford)
• Carla Shatz Kavli Prize Laureate Lecture
• Stanford scientists discover a protein in nerves that determines which brain connections stay and which go (Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute)

Episode Credits
This episode was produced by Webby award-winning producer Michael Osborne, with production assistance by Morgan Honaker, and hosted by Nicholas Weiler. Art by Aimee Garza.

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