Welcome to the Brain Health Revolution podcast with your hosts, Aisha and Dean Sharesai.

In this episode, we sat down with Dr. Ben Ryan, a neuroscientist and postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University, and a science communicator on social media.

Ben's thesis research focused on autism spectrum disorder and identified key systems in the brain

that regulate social behavior. His current research at Stanford University is focused on the

neural basis of empathy

and mechanisms by which empathic behaviors can be enhanced.

Outside of the lab, Ben creates educational science videos on social media,

which is so impressive and so needed.

In his videos, he summarizes recent research papers, teaches fundamental science principles,

and debunks viral videos containing misinformation. Ben's science communication has been recognized

with awards from Stanford University, the American Association for the Advancement of Science,

the Mind Science Foundation, and many more.

We spoke about our current understanding of autism, the advances in the field, the misinformation

in the realm of neuroscience and brain, and much more. We hope you enjoy this conversation.

Thank you for joining us. Ben, it's so nice to meet you. Thank you so much for joining us.

Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I'm looking forward to our discussion. Dean and I have really

enjoyed your posts and your Instagram and TikTok presence and how you simplify the neuroscience

of behavior, just being a human being at this day and age,

and try to bust some myths about brain.

And so we were looking forward to speaking with you about your work and about how your day goes as a neuroscientist and you know what your interests are so

really excited to be here yeah it's one of the things we we really enjoy is reason-based content and

and i always say i love tic-tok and social media as much as people think it's got a lot of bad, which is 99.9%.

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