The brain uses backward instant replays to remember important travel routes

(Johns Hopkins Medicine) Johns Hopkins neuroscientists believe they have figured out how some rats solve certain navigational problems. If there's a 'reward' at the end of the trip, like the chocolatey drink used in this study, specialized neurons in the hippocampus of the brain 'replay' the route taken to get it, but backward. And the greater the reward, the more often the rats' brains replay it.

from EurekAlert! - Social and Behavioral Science http://ift.tt/2bJGvIR