Name: Changing the Brain - Interview with Prof. Lara Boyd from the University of British Columbia
Uploaded: 2016-06-15T14:30:00.000Z
Duration: 2 min 2 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

To-infinitive

What we've started to learn, or learned in the last 10-15 years, is that the brain is

this amazingly dynamic structure. Everything you do changes your brain. When you're done

watching this today, your brain is not the same as when you started. And so in beginning

to understand that amount of change, we've been able to drill down and start to see what

parts of the brain change, what changes them, and why. And that's really exciting because

it opens up a whole new field of discovery for everything from kids learning to school,

I go to work in the morning because I am absolutely fascinated by this idea that we can change

the brain. The brain is who we are and you can flip it on its ear and say we are what

our brain is. The best part about that is because the brain changes so much, you can

shift it; you can change it. So if you learn new things, you take new opportunities, you

start participating in new activities, you're changing who you are. And so it gives us kind of this

idea of endless possibility, if you will. The other really exciting thing about

that is we didn't know that 20 years ago. So this is relatively new knowledge in science

and we are discovering things so quickly about the brain that it's just opening up new fields,

new areas of education, new areas of medicine, amazingly quickly.

I'm optimistic that we're starting a new cycle of discovery that is going to allow us to

develop really effective therapies for people who have had stroke or other kinds of acquired

brain damage. Stroke is the third leading cause of death in the world. It's the leading

cause of long-term adult disability in the world. And so we are all at significant risk

for it, especially as we age. So we need to have better therapies.