Nobel for Brain   s Location Code The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine went to three researchers who made key discoveries about how the brain represents an animal   s position in space orienting it and letting it navigate.Half the $1.1 million prize was awarded to John O   Keefe who discovered cells in the hippocampus of rats that fired off in reaction to specific places the animals were in. The work on such     place cells   was later expanded upon by a married couple from Norway May-Britt and Edvard Moser who shared in the prize for their discovery of a separate type of cell grid cells which allow animals to navigate.From the announcement by the Nobel Assembly based at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm:An important aspect the Nobel-winning work was that it was among the first to directly observe the so-called     codes   by which neurons express information in this case by altering how quickly it fires. In Cracking the Brain   s Codes from our July/August issue researchers Christof Koch and Gary Marcus foreshadowed today   s Nobel awards:These discoveries have since been extended by other scientists including Matthew Wilson at MIT whose lab has measured from dozens of brain cells at once producing striking videos like the one below showing place neurons firing as a rat moves through a maze.Researchers say the findings may point to future technologies. Some engineers for instance have used the idea of grid cells as inspiration for new algorithms to control robots or autonomous submarines. Others are experimenting to see if they can rewrite memories. In July DARPA gave out $40 million in awards to try to develop brain implants that would help brain-injured soldiers recover lost memories or have an easier time forming new ones.But the brain has 86 billion neurons and scientists still can   t claim to have broken more than bits and pieces of how it codes information. The frenzy of spikes or firing of neurons in a rat   s brain when it reaches a familiar place is just part of the story according to Koch and Marcus: