Pine Crest student produces cutting edge research on sensory condition called synesthesia.


To the average reader, the words on this page are simply black. But for some, by the time they've reached this word, they've seen almost every color on the spectrum.

It's called synesthesia - a rare neurological condition that causes a sort of sensory remix allowing people like 16-year-old Laura Mariah Herman to see pink when she hears or reads her name, see orange when she hears "hello" or see red when she sees the letter "A."

It's believed geniuses like Albert Einstein had this, too.

"I have a special connection with colors," says Laura, a student at Pine Crest School in Fort Lauderdale. "It's my special superpower."

Laura describes it as a "ticker tape" lodged like a screen behind her eyes that constantly streams with colored words of what she's seeing, hearing and even thinking - "I read my thoughts," she says.

To Laura every letter and number is a specific shade - she has grapheme-color synesthesia. But there's all types of variations. There are those that taste music - Laura for example thinks rap is salty and techno is tangy - others see colors to ideas and movements or feel sounds on their skin.

"It's the interaction of any of the senses," she says.

It wasn't until 7th grade that Laura realized not everyone lived in her world of color. When her teacher mentioned Einstein's strange color sensitivities, she thought, "Wait, doesn't everyone see this way?"

Fascinated by what she soon discovered was a hereditary trait, Laura began researching the condition and was accepted into her school's prestigious science research program. For the past year, she's spent time researching with folks at Harvard University, spoken at national conferences and is trying to get her original research published.

"It's pretty exceptional research for a junior in high school," said Jennifer Gordinier, coordinator of the science research program. "Laura lives her research."

Over the summer, Laura collected data from English, German and Spanish subjects to see if there was a correlation was between color and letters. She found that more frequently used letters are associated with longer wavelength colors - like reds and oranges.

Using the color-letter association data, Laura has come up with her own neurological theory: A fusion between two lobes in the brain causes synesthesia.

"This is all novel," said Gordinier, adding that Laura is at the cutting edge of the research. "She's content to be in the trenches ... 'what can I do next, how can I advance this?' And that's the sign of a true scientist."

But Laura wants to take her research even further.

Because disorders like autism, epilepsy and schizophrenia are also caused by excess connections in the brain, she says, understanding synesthetes can help expand research in those areas.

"I want to help people that are suffering from these connections that I benefit from," says Laura.