Australia’s ABC reports about a new neurophysiology research tool:
The temperature of your inner ear provides a new way of understanding whether you’re using your left or right brain, says an Australian researcher.
Nicolas Cherbuin, a PhD student from the Australian National University in Canberra, used sensitive infrared probes to measure minute fluctuations in the temperature of inner ear membranes.
He says the temperature inside the left ear goes down when the left side of the brain is activated and the temperature of the right ear goes down when the right side of the brain is activated.
If one side is activated more than the other, the blood flow on that side is greater.
But because blood flowing to the brain is cooler than blood already in the brain, and because blood to the brain is shared by the ear, ear temperature drops, Cherbuin says.
“Because the blood in the carotid is actually cooler than in the brain, which is encased … the blood flow from the carotid cools the brain but also the ear membrane,” he says.
“Therefore what we find is that as activity in the brain increases the temperature in the ear decreases.”
Australian National University’s press release…