{"id":243095,"date":"2026-08-23T09:07:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T14:07:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/08\/scientists-discover-learning-and-memory-formation-in-model-membranes"},"modified":"2026-08-23T09:07:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T14:07:13","slug":"scientists-discover-learning-and-memory-formation-in-model-membranes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/08\/scientists-discover-learning-and-memory-formation-in-model-membranes","title":{"rendered":"Scientists discover learning and memory formation in model membranes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"padding-right: 20px\"><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/scientists-discover-learning-and-memory-formation-in-model-membranes.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cScience is a conversation,\u201d said John Katsaras, neutron scattering scientist at ORNL\u2019s Spallation Neutron Source, a Department of Energy Office of Science user facility. \u201cMany years ago, Pat [Collier] and I wanted to see what would happen when we combined our scientific interests. He wanted to explore soft matter systems for neuromorphic computing [computing systems designed to mimic how the brain processes information], and I\u2019ve studied the structure and dynamics of lipid membranes over the past 40 years. We are now applying decades of our soft matter experience to a problem neither one of us would have imagined pursuing five years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Soft matter includes materials that readily change shape, such as membranes, gels and polymers. Although biological membranes vary in complexity, they all share a common foundation: a lipid bilayer, or double layer of molecules. Each lipid contains a hydrophilic (water-attracting) head and a hydrophobic (water-repelling) tail.<\/p>\n<p>To study membrane properties under electrical stimulation, Katsaras and Collier used water droplets suspended in oil, known as a droplet interface bilayer. These early experiments <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ornl.gov\/news\/biomembrane-research-findings-could-advance-understanding-computing-and-human-memory\">showed unexpected electrical data<\/a>, prompting them to shift their attention to membranes surrounding neurons, where many memory and learning processes occur.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cScience is a conversation,\u201d said John Katsaras, neutron scattering scientist at ORNL\u2019s Spallation Neutron Source, a Department of Energy Office of Science user facility. \u201cMany years ago, Pat [Collier] and I wanted to see what would happen when we combined our scientific interests. He wanted to explore soft matter systems for neuromorphic computing [computing systems [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,1523,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-243095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biological","category-computing","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243095\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}