as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless

as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Inception, researchers discovered ways to manipulate specific memories in mice using optogenetics, a powerful technique that can trigger
nerve cells in anin nimals' brains by zapping them with beams of laser light. In a series of experiments, they showed that they could delete existing mem
emories and "incept" false ones.
This year, researchers went even further: switching the emotional content of a memory in mice from bad to good and vice versa. Under the laser, for example, male mice that had once
associated a certain room with being shocked were tricked into acting as though they had once met friendly female mice there instead.
Whether the mice in these experiments actually experienced vivid false
memories or just fuzzy sense of pleasure or fear is unclear.Nor) is it clear whether the findings apply to the tricks of memory so familiar to people. Long-sought therapeutic advances, such as treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder, could remain far off. One thing is certain, however: Once considered beyond scientific dissection, memory is finally starting to yield its secrets.