• Skip to main content
  • Skip to header right navigation
  • Skip to site footer
  • WordPress
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
Science Update

Science Update

Sharing Science | Satisfying Curiosity | Debunking BS

  • Spotlights
  • Reality Check
  • Why Is It?
  • Radio Archives
  • Sciup @ School
Home » Radio Archive » Daily Show » Birdsong Dreams

Birdsong Dreams

August 6, 2018
https://podcast.scienceupdate.com/180806_sciup_song.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window

Celebrated songsters, zebra finches provide a window into the mechanics of song while dreaming. (Pixel2013/Pixabay)
Celebrated songsters, zebra finches provide a window into the mechanics of song production while dreaming. (Pixel2013/Pixabay)

BOB HIRSHON (host):

Birdsong dreams. I’m Bob Hirshon and this is Science Update.

(zebra finch song)

This is the song of a zebra finch when it’s awake. But researchers have discovered that while asleep, the birds activate the same vocal cord muscles they use for singing during the day. University of Buenos Aires physicist Gabriel Mindlin and his team played the birds their own songs while they slept, measuring how their  vocal cord muscles responded. Then they created simulated songs by piecing together the sounds that corresponded to those patterns.

(simulated zebra finch song)

GABRIEL MINDLIN (University of Buenos Aires):

You can translate those patterns of activity exactly into a song. Therefore with this biophysical window to the brain, you can actual listen to what the bird is dreaming.

HIRSHON:

The researchers write in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that dreaming might help the birds maintain their singing muscles or remember their songs. I’m Bob Hirshon, for AAAS, the science society.

Story by Susanne Bard

Category: Daily Show, Station DownloadTag: Acoustics & Sound, Animal Behavior, Wildlife
Previous Post:Birds & Alligators
Next Post:Soft Deep-Sea Robots

Sidebar

Radio Program Archives

Want to learn more about the brain? The environment? Here you can browse the topics that come up regularly on Science Update.

Search the Archives

Categories

  • Daily Show
  • Station Download
  • Weekly Show

Find By Tag

  • 2020
  • Acoustics & Sound
  • Aging
  • Animal Behavior
  • Anthropology
  • Archaeology
  • Astronomy & Space
  • Biology
  • Brain Science
  • Bugs
  • Cat Video
  • Chemistry
  • Children & Families
  • cicadas
  • Climate & Weather
  • Communications
  • Computer Science
  • Economics & Business
  • Education
  • Energy
  • Engineering & Technology
  • Environment & Conservation
  • Genetics & Evolution
  • Geology
  • Marine Science
  • Materials Science
  • Mathematics
  • Medicine & Health
  • Microbiology
  • Nanotechnology
  • NASA
  • Nutrition & Food Science
  • Paleontology & Dinosaurs
  • Physics
  • Plants & Agriculture
  • Political Science
  • Reality Check
  • Social & Behavioral Sciences
  • Sports & Fitness
  • spotlight
  • Spotlight Bugs
  • Terrorism & War
  • Why Is It? Questions
  • Wildlife
  • Year in Review

Find By Date

Science Update
  • About Science Update
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • YouTube

Recent Posts

Image of computer screen depicting an orange cat with a variety of alphanumeric scientific data superimposed on the the screen.
Spotted skunk performing handstand to threaten predators

Copyright © 2025 · Springtail Media LLC · All Rights Reserved · Powered by Pongos