Pictures: Rhode Island households take pleasure in a day of discovery on the Brown Brain Fair

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — The 2026 Brown Brain Fair introduced a burst of brightness to a cool, overcast Sunday in mid-March, drawing a whole lot of native youngsters, households and neighborhood members to Brown University for a day of scientific discovery, hands-on studying and household enjoyable.

Held on March 15, the free, all-ages occasion crammed Sayles Hall with scientists, researchers and volunteers from greater than 25 Brown laboratories and facilities. Together, they remodeled the house right into a full of life hub of interactive stations, experiments and video games the place guests may check their data of neuroanatomy, watch their mind waves seem on a display screen, and discover how the mind powers reminiscence, motion and extra.

For greater than a decade, the honest has turned advanced mind science into actions designed to spark curiosity in learners of all ages. Luc Gagne, who traveled from Warwick, Rhode Island, stated he has attended the occasion for years, bringing his two children — now 10 and 16 — to campus once more this 12 months.

“The Brain Fair always has a lot of engaging things for the kids, and you learn something new every time,” Gagne stated. “The talks are usually really good, and it’s fun to discover new things and keep up with science in general.” 

The annual occasion is organized by the Brown Brain Bee scholar group in collaboration with the Carney Institute for Brain Science and held in partnership with Brain Waves Rhode Island. Brown undergraduate Eric Jiang, co-president of the Brown Brain Bee, has helped to arrange the honest since 2024. This 12 months, greater than 100 scholar volunteers arrange stations, welcomed guests and ran demonstrations all through the day, he stated.

“My favorite part of the fair is running the popcorn machine,” Jiang stated. “Families and kids come over after interacting with robotic arms from BrainGate, seeing their brain waves scanned with EEG electrodes, or getting neurons painted on their faces. When we ask their favorite station or brain fact they learned, we hear everything from how memory works in the hippocampus to how long the longest neuron in the body is.”

At one of many honest’s busiest stations, contributors watched the mind’s electrical indicators in motion. When one volunteer clenched their fist, sensors detected {the electrical} exercise of their arm and transmitted the sign to a different participant, inflicting their fingers to twitch — a stunning demonstration of how the mind makes use of electrical energy to speak with muscle tissues.  

Ashley Bentley of Barrington, Rhode Island, watched whereas her husband tried the experiment with their 6-year-old son.

“You could see my son’s little eyebrows furrow as he tried to figure out what in the world was going on,” Bentley stated. “Moments like that are exciting — you know they’ll remember them forever. Anything that surprises them and makes them pause, look a little closer and explore a little deeper, it’s such a joyful way to spark curiosity and it’s fun that we can experience that curiosity together.”

Another recreation challenged guests to information a rising nerve fiber via a Pac-Man–model maze, following useful magnetic indicators whereas avoiding opposing, repelling ones. The exercise demonstrated how creating neurons discover their manner via the mind to type the connections that energy pondering and motion.