Sofia Marie Haley, University of Nevada, Reno

I approach a flock of mountain chickadees feasting on pine nuts. A cacophony of sounds, coming from the many different bird species that rely on the Sierra Nevada’s diverse pine cone crop, fill the crisp mountain air.

The strong “chick-a-dee” call sticks out among the bird vocalizations. The chickadees are communicating to each other about food sources – and my approach.

Mountain chickadees are a member of the family Paridae, which is known for its complex vocal communication systems and cognitive abilities. Along with my advisers, behavioral ecologists Vladimir Pravosudov and Carrie Branch, I’m studying mountain chickadees at our study site in Sagehen Experimental Forest, outside of Truckee, California, for my doctoral research. I am focusing on how these birds convey a variety of information with their calls.

The chilly autumn air on top of the mountain reminds me that it will soon be winter. It is time for the mountain chickadees to leave the socially monogamous partnerships they had while raising their chicks to form larger flocks. Forming social groups is not always simple; young chickadees are joining new flocks, and social dynamics need to be established before the winter storms arrive.

I can hear them working this out vocally. There’s an unusual variety of complex calls, with melodic “gargle calls” at the forefront, coming from individuals announcing their dominance over other flock members.

Examining and decoding bird calls is becoming an increasingly popular field of study, as scientists like me are discovering that many birds – including mountain chickadees – follow systematic rules to share important information, stringing together syllables like words in a sentence.

Songs vs. calls

For social animals, communication is a crucial part of everyday life. Communication can come in the form of visual, chemical, tactile, electrical or vocal signals.

Birds are highly vocal, often relying on vocal communication to effectively interact with their environments and flock members. Temperate songbirds, including cardinals, bluebirds, wrens and blackbirds, have two main categories of vocalizations: songs and calls.

Songs are vocalizations that are used primarily in the spring, during breeding season. Males in temperate regions sing to attract females and defend territories.

Calls are basically any vocalization that is not a song. This category includes a limitless variety of vocalizations that communicate all sorts of essential information.

Most songbird species have complex songs and fairly simple calls. This is why vocalizations sound most melodic during the spring, when birds are attracting mates and breeding.

However, chickadees are unusual in that they sing very simple songs relative to the complexity of their calls. Research suggests this is largely due to their social structure and complex environments. Living in flocks for the majority of the year means they need an elaborate communication system year-round. This is in contrast to many other songbird species that are more solitary during the nonbreeding season.

Scientists know quite a lot about birdsong: It is highly organized and composed of multiple units that are strung together into “phrases,” like how musical notes are strung together in a song.

Some species manipulate their song to sound more impressive, by incorporating new elements or performing impressive acoustic feats through note modification – imagine a trill or an impressive high note.

Some songbirds must learn their songs from their parents and other adult males during a sensitive period in the first several months of their lives. It’s similar to how human children must learn how to speak from adults during a similar early sensitive period.

In contrast, we know relatively little about the structure and organization of complex calls. Scientists have often regarded calls as unexciting and simple compared with birdsong. However, calls are arguably the most important type of vocalization, at least for highly social bird species.

Translating mountain chickadee calls

I spend my days out at our field site in the beautiful Sierra Nevada, following and recording chickadees as they communicate with each other. I have taken numerous focal recordings, where I stand in the forest with a directional microphone, identifying vocalizations and behaviors in real time.

I also have hundreds of hours of recordings taken by automated recording devices called AudioMoths. These allow me to record vocalizations in the absence of people.

The extensive vocal repertoire of mountain chickadees has yet to be fully documented. There are five basic categories of call types:

• Contact calls: communicate identity, sort of like a name, and location.
• “Chick-a-dee” calls: coordinate flock movement and communicate a variety of complex information about the environment, from food availability to predator presence and type.
• Alarm calls: alert others of the presence of a predator.
• Begging calls: used by chicks or females to elicit feeding behavior from males.
• Gargle calls: advertise dominance over other individuals in a flock, primarily used by males.

“Chick-a-dee” calls contain several elements resembling the basic elements of human grammar. Essentially, the various sounds a chickadee utters mean different things, similar to words in human languages. And the way that a chickadee combines these sounds changes the meaning. Word order matters, just like grammar matters in human language. If a chickadee were to phrase its calls in the wrong note order, the call would no longer convey the same meaning, even if composed of the same elements.

The “chick-a-dee” call of the mountain chickadee contains six elements, known as notes or syllables, that can be combined in hundreds of unique combinations to say many different things. These elements are labeled A, A/B, B, C, D and Dh.

Although scientists don’t fully know the meaning of each note in different contexts, it is generally believed that A notes typically contain identifying information about how important the topic seems to the caller, while A/B and B notes tend to further inform the listener of the topic of conversation. C notes contain information about the subject of the call, often a food source, and D notes convey information about the excitement and urgency of the message, including level of threat of a spotted predator or size of a food source. The D notes basically function like exclamation points at the end of a sentence, while the other notes convey more specific information.

Mountain chickadees can use their “chick-a-dee” calls to convey hundreds of different phrases that are relevant to navigating their habitats and social environments. As a hypothetical example, a mountain chickadee call might have the following syntax: A-A-A/B-B-D-D, which could roughly translate to something like, “Listen to me carefully (A-A): there is a predator (A/B) close by (B) and a medium threat level (DD).”

If the note order switched to D-A-B-D-A/B-A, the sentence would look more like: “Noteworthy listen close by noteworthy predator listen to me.” Although all the same elements are there, this sentence is now much more difficult to comprehend. Notes that are out of order can confuse chickadees, preventing them from grasping the correct meaning of the call.

This “translation” is an example based on what we have learned from playback experiments, but the exact meaning will depend on the specific population and surrounding environment.

Analyzing the ‘chick-a-dee’ calls

Back in the lab, I parse through the endless hours of recordings using a deep-learning algorithm that I have modified to identify the specific calls of our chickadee population.

I then use Raven Pro software, developed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, to visually inspect and analyze these calls on a spectrogram: a visual representation of sound, with frequency on the vertical axis, and time on the horizontal axis. This visualization allows me to study the structure of calls in great detail.

Studying spectrograms can get me only so far. The next step is to experimentally test different “chick-a-dee” calls out in the wild. Using audio editing software, I manipulate the syntax of calls to either follow grammatical rules or violate them. Then, I broadcast these manipulated recordings out in the forest and observe how our chickadees react to grammatically incorrect calls, which would sound like gibberish to them.

My hope is that this combination of experimental testing of calls and careful visual analysis will provide a step toward understanding the subtle complexities of chickadee communication. I’m trying to home in on the meaning of different syllables and syntax, the grammatical rules.

Back in the forest with my directional microphone, watching the chickadees flit about, I hear different versions of the “chick-a-dee” calls. Some feature more D notes, which would indicate a higher level of excitement. Others feature more A, B or C notes, communicating more specific, identifying information. I am also surrounded by melodic gargle calls, harsh scolding calls and barely audible soft calls.

Next time you find yourself out in the forest, stop and listen to the chickadees as they talk to each other. Maybe you’ll be able to hear the variation in their calls and know that they are talking about different things − and that grammar matters.

Sofia Marie Haley, Ph.D. Student in Cognitive Ecology, University of Nevada, Reno

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Lucinda Grande, University of Washington

Imagine a patient named Rosa tells you she wakes up night after night in a drenching sweat after having very realistic dreams of smoking fentanyl.

The dreams seem crazy to her. Three months ago, newly pregnant, Rosa began visualizing being a good parent. She realized it was finally time to give up her self-destructive use of street fentanyl. With tremendous effort, she started treatment with buprenorphine for her opioid use disorder.

As hoped, she was intensely relieved to be free from the distressing withdrawal symptoms – restless legs, anxiety, bone pain, nausea and chills – and from the guilt, shame and hardship of living with addiction. But even so, Rosa found herself musing throughout the day about the rewarding rush of fentanyl, which seemed ever more appealing. And she couldn’t escape those dreams at night.

Rosa asks you, her doctor, for a higher dose of buprenorphine. You consider her request carefully. Your clinic follows the Food and Drug Administration prescribing guideline that has changed very little in over 20 years. It recommends her current prescription – 16 milligrams – as the “target” dose. You are aware of the prevailing view among medical providers that most patients don’t need a dose higher than that. Many believe that patients or others would use the extra pills to get high.

But after many visits, you feel that you know Rosa well. You believe in her sincerity. She is a responsible 25-year-old with a full-time job who never misses appointments. She now has stable housing with her parents after years of couch surfing. You reluctantly agree and raise her daily dose by one additional 8-milligram pill, totaling 24 milligrams.

At her next visit, Rosa tells you that the higher dose solved her daytime fentanyl craving, but the nightmares have continued. She would like to try an even higher dose.

How should you respond? The FDA guideline clearly states there is no evidence to support any benefit above her new dose. You begin to doubt Rosa’s sincerity and your own judgment.

Harms of low doses

This hypothetical scenario has played out countless times in the U.S. since 2002, when buprenorphine was first approved as a treatment for opioid use disorder. As a family physician specializing in addiction medicine, I have frequently encountered patients who still experience withdrawal symptoms at the “target dose” and even at the suggested maximum dose of 24 milligrams.

People like Rosa, plagued by uncontrolled fentanyl craving – either awake or in dreams – are at high risk of leaving treatment and returning to addiction. Yet from 2019 to 2020, only 2% of buprenorphine prescriptions were written for over 24 milligrams.

I was able to help some of those people in my work as co-founder and medical director of a low-barrier clinic, which is a clinic that makes it easier for people to get started with buprenorphine. I asked our clinicians to offer a higher dose when they believed the current one wasn’t meeting the patient’s needs.

The dose choice may be a life-or-death decision. Increasing it by one more pill – to 32 milligrams – often makes the difference between a patient staying in or leaving treatment. The risk of leaving treatment is particularly significant for the patients we typically see at low-barrier clinics, many of whom face severe life challenges. While patients do sometimes give away or sell extra pills, research consistently shows that illegally obtained pills are most commonly used for self-treatment – to control withdrawal and help quit opioids when treatment is unavailable.

Medicaid in my state of Washington began paying for prescriptions up to 32 milligrams in 2019. But clinicians may still encounter constraints from other health insurers and at pharmacies. Some states, such as Tennessee, Kentucky and Ohio, have dose restrictions cemented in law.

Finding the right dose

The challenge of finding the right treatment dose became more acute for clinicians and patients as fentanyl swept across the country starting in 2013. Fentanyl now dominates the unregulated opioid supply. Fifty times stronger than heroin, fentanyl overwhelms the ability of low doses of buprenorphine to counter its effects.

Buprenorphine – also known by the brand name Suboxone, which contains a mix of buprenorphine and naloxone – is an opioid medication with the quirk of both activating the brain’s opioid receptors and partially blocking them. It provides just enough opioid effects to prevent withdrawal symptoms and craving while also blocking the reward of euphoria. It relieves pain like other opioids but doesn’t cause breathing to stop. It can dramatically reduce the risk of overdose death by as much as 70%.

In medicine, there is a general concern that too high a dose may have toxic effects. However, as many clinicians and researchers have observed, using too low a dose of some treatments can also lead to harm, including death from patients going back to fentanyl.

After observing so many patients responding well to higher doses, my colleagues and I looked in the medical literature for more information. We discovered over a dozen reports as far back as 1999 providing evidence that buprenorphine’s benefits steadily increase up to at least 32 milligrams.

At higher doses, patients stay on treatment longer, use illicit opioids less often, have fewer complications such as hepatitis C, have fewer emergency room visits and hospitalizations, and suffer less from chronic pain. Brain scans show that buprenorphine at 32 milligrams occupies more opioid receptors – over 90% of receptors in some brain regions – compared with lower doses. One study even showed that a high enough dose of buprenorphine can directly prevent fentanyl overdose.

Patients with some health conditions may especially benefit from higher doses. During pregnancy, as in Rosa’s case, withdrawal symptoms can grow more intense because of metabolism changes that reduce the blood concentration of most medications. A higher dose may be needed to maintain the level of effects they had before pregnancy. Additionally, I found that the patients in my clinic with chronic pain, post-traumatic stress disorder or longtime opioid use were most likely to find relief at a dose above 24 milligrams.

The American Society of Addiction Medicine recommends
four goals of treatment: suppressing opioid withdrawal, blocking the effects of illicit opioids, stopping opioid cravings and reducing the use of illicit opioids, and promoting recovery-oriented activities.

Similarly, patients seek a comfortable and effective dose – that is, one that avoids withdrawal symptoms and craving, and allows them to avoid illicit drug use and the associated worry and stress. Many patients also yearn to feel trusted, accepted and understood by their clinician. Achieving that goal requires shared decision-making.

A clinician can never be sure a patient is meeting all the goals of treatment. But a patient who reports positive life changes – such as stable housing and improved relationships – and reports low or no craving while awake or dreaming will likely be satisfied with the current dose. For a patient who does not make progress with a dose increase to 32 milligrams, the clinician might consider a different treatment plan, such as a 30-day buprenorphine injection, which can provide an even higher dose, or transition to methadone, the other highly effective FDA-approved medication for opioid use disorder.

The FDA guideline change

In August 2022, a team of addiction physicians attempted to move the FDA to change dosing guidelines for buprenorphine. They submitted a petition asking for a modernized guideline that based dosing on how a patient responds to buprenorphine – including symptom relief and reduced illicit drug use – rather than a fixed “target” dose. They asked to remove language that incorrectly denied evidence that patients benefited from doses above 24 milligrams.

The FDA listened. In December 2023, it convened a public meeting with leading addiction clinicians, researchers and policymakers to review the evidence on buprenorphine dosing. The group came to an overwhelming consensus that there was extensive research showing benefit at doses above 24 milligrams. Moreover, they doubted whether the guideline’s dosing conclusions, made before fentanyl infiltrated the drug supply, applied today.

Then, the FDA responded. In December 2024, it announced a new buprenorphine recommendation that would not mention a target dose and would not deny the existence of evidence of benefits above 24 milligrams. Only time will tell whether and when the FDA’s new guideline will meaningfully alter prescribing patterns, insurance and pharmacy restrictions, and state laws.

To maintain the national trend toward lower overdose deaths, the best possible use of each effective treatment is critical. Yet the Trump administration’s proposed cuts to Medicaid – which covers nearly half of all buprenorphine prescriptions – put access seriously at risk. Most people with untreated addiction would be blocked from accessing treatment altogether, let alone at an effective dose or with the behavioral health, social work and recovery support services needed for the best outcomes. Research shows that a sharp reduction in buprenorphine prescriptions occurred following 2023 Medicaid coverage restrictions.

Opioid use disorder is treatable. Buprenorphine works well and saves lives when given at the right dose. An inadequate dose can directly harm patients who are simply trying to survive and improve their lives.

Lucinda Grande, Clinical Associate Professor of Family Medicine, University of Washington

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Dobromir Rahnev, Georgia Institute of Technology

Curious Kids is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com.

Is it possible to upload the consciousness of your mind into a computer? – Amreen, age 15, New Delhi, India

The concept, cool yet maybe a little creepy, is known as mind uploading. Think of it as a way to create a copy of your brain, a transmission of your mind and consciousness into a computer. There you would live digitally, perhaps forever. You’d have an awareness of yourself, you’d retain your memories and still feel like you. But you wouldn’t have a body.

Within that simulated environment, you could do anything you do in real life – eating, driving a car, playing sports. You could also do things impossible in the real world, like walking through walls, flying like a bird or traveling to other planets. The only limit is what science can realistically simulate.

Doable? Theoretically, mind uploading should be possible. Still, you may wonder how it could happen. After all, researchers have barely begun to understand the brain.

Yet science has a track record of turning theoretical possibilities into reality. Just because a concept seems terribly, unimaginably difficult doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Consider that science took humankind to the Moon, sequenced the human genome and eradicated smallpox. Those things too were once considered unlikely.

As a brain scientist who studies perception,
I fully expect mind uploading to one day be a reality. But as of today, we’re nowhere close.

Living in a laptop

The brain is often regarded as the most complex object in the known universe. Replicating all that complexity will be extraordinarily difficult.

One requirement: The uploaded brain needs the same inputs it always had. In other words, the external world must be available to it. Even cloistered inside a computer, you would still need a simulation of your senses, a reproduction of the ability to see, hear, smell, touch, feel – as well as move, blink, detect your heart rate, set your circadian rhythm and do thousands of other things.

But why is that? Couldn’t you just exist in a pure mental bubble, inside the computer without sensory input?

Depriving people of their senses, like putting them in total darkness, or in a room without sound, is known as sensory deprivation, and it’s regarded as a form of torture. People who have trouble sensing their bodily signals – thirst, hunger, pain, an itch – often have mental health challenges.

That’s why for mind uploading to work, the simulation of your senses and the digital environment you’re in must be exceptionally accurate. Even minor distortions could have serious mental consequences.

For now, researchers don’t have the computing power, much less the scientific knowledge, to perform such simulations.

Scanning billions of pinheads

The first task for a successful mind upload: Scanning, then mapping the complete 3D structure of the human brain. This requires the equivalent of an extraordinarily sophisticated MRI machine that could detail the brain in an advanced way. At the moment, scientists are only at the very early stages of brain mapping – which includes the entire brain of a fly and tiny portions of a mouse brain.

In a few decades, a complete map of the human brain may be possible. Yet even capturing the identities of all 86 billion neurons, all smaller than a pinhead, plus their trillions of connections, still isn’t enough. Uploading this information by itself into a computer won’t accomplish much. That’s because each neuron constantly adjusts its functioning, and that has to be modeled, too.

It’s hard to know how many levels down researchers must go to make the simulated brain work. Is it enough to stop at the molecular level? Right now, no one knows.

2045? 2145? Or later?

Knowing how the brain computes things might provide a shortcut. That would let researchers simulate only the essential parts of the brain, and not all biological idiosyncrasies. It’s easier to manufacture a new car knowing how a car works, compared to attempting to scan and replicate an existing car without any knowledge of its inner workings.

However, this approach requires that scientists figure out how the brain creates thoughts – how collections of thousands to millions of neurons come together to perform the computations that make the human mind come alive. It’s hard to express how very far we are from this.

Here’s another way: Replace the 86 billion real neurons with artificial ones, one at a time. That approach would make mind uploading much easier. Right now, though, scientists can’t replace even a single real neuron with an artificial one.

But keep in mind the pace of technology is accelerating exponentially. It’s reasonable to expect spectacular improvements in computing power and artificial intelligence in the coming decades.

One other thing is certain: Mind uploading will certainly have no problem finding funding. Many billionaires appear glad to part with lots of their money for a shot at living forever.

Although the challenges are enormous and the path forward uncertain, I believe that one day, mind uploading will be a reality. The most optimistic forecasts pinpoint the year 2045, only 20 years from now. Others say the end of this century.

But in my mind, both of these predictions are probably too optimistic. I would be shocked if mind uploading works in the next 100 years. But it might happen in 200 – which means the first person to live forever could be born in your lifetime.

Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.

And since curiosity has no age limit – adults, let us know what you’re wondering, too. We won’t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.

Dobromir Rahnev, Associate Professor of Psychology, Georgia Institute of Technology

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.