It's time to have the brain examined

What better way to show how science - and the brain - works than to let the public in on the experiment?

IF YOU HAVE ever fancied an opportunity to be a human guinea pig and have your brain activity recorded, here's your chance. This month members of the public can contribute to neuroscience research by participating in real experiments at the Science Gallery at Trinity College Dublin.

Entitled "Pay Attention", the initiative moves a working neuroscience lab into the gallery and the researchers conduct business as usual there in full view of the public, explains the Science Gallery's director, Dr Michael John Gorman.

"It started off as the idea of asking what would happen if we took a working research lab and shipped the whole thing into a public space, and we were thinking about how that could work," says Gorman.

"And we thought, would it be even better to have scientists doing their work visible from the street, and you could have the public being able to participate in experiments as human subjects," he adds.

Trinity brain researchers Prof Ian Roberston and Prof Richard Reilly embraced the idea, and this Saturday sees a working lab swing into action in the Science Gallery to carry out experiments.

"The theme of the research is on attention, which is one of the most important functions of the human brain," says Roberston, who is professor of psychology at Trinity. "Attention affects everything ranging from road accidents to people's ability to study, to disorders like schizophrenia, dementia and attention-deficit disorder."

Core experiments will look at phenomena such as the "cocktail party effect" - where humans can focus on one conversation to the exclusion of others - as well as face-recognition, paying attention under pressure and whether your brain works better in the morning or evening.

The resulting data will be publishable, says Robertson. "We are absolutely adamant that all the main experiments here are what we would be doing over in the [Trinity] Institute of Neuroscience.

"We are moving our brain-recording apparatus into the Science Gallery so people can see scientists at work."

Subjects will be monitored using a special cap with sensors and EEG technology, and individuals may be able to get feedback on their results, says Robertson. "We won't be able to give them a printout about their cognitive abilities, but in some cases we will be able to give them some feedback," he says.

Visitors can also take part in fun demonstrations of attention and awareness at the Gallery, such as the "rubber hand" experiment, or use their brain-waves to control images and play games on a computer screen.

"We hope that this is just the beginning of a series where we bring in all sorts of labs," says Gorman. "These are things that people don't normally get to see, and it is an opportunity for people to get a sense of what research is in a very immediate way."

• Pay Attention runs from October 4th to 31st at the Science Gallery, Pearse Street, Dublin 2. Participants in core experiments must be over 18. See www.sciencegallery.com/lab_gallery for more details of experiments and how to sign up