In this episode, host Rachel Feltman interviews neuroscientist Kauê M. Costa, who is among Scientific American’s inaugural cohort of Young American Scientists honorees. Costa shares how being surprised by experiments has led him to new ways of thinking about learning in the brain. He explains how dopamine does more than signal reward, how there are two big frameworks of how the brain learns and how his findings could help us better understand—and treat—mental illness.

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The Young American Scientists

Kauê M. Costa’s Young American Scientists profile

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Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Sushmita Pathak and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura, with fact-checking by Aaron Shattuck. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith.

This episode is part of “The Young American Scientists,” an editorially independent project that was produced with financial support from Regeneron.

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