Neuroscience posts
- July 29, 2016
- 03:55 PM
- 22 views
Breastfeeding associated with better brain development and neurocognitive outcomes
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
A new study, which followed 180 preterm infants from birth to age seven, found that babies who were fed more breast milk within the first 28 days of life had had larger volumes of certain regions of the brain at term equivalent and had better IQs, academic achievement, working memory, and motor function.
... Read more »
Mandy B. Belfort, MD, Peter J. Anderson, PhD, Victoria A. Nowak, MBBS, Katherine J. Lee, PhD, Charlotte Molesworth, Deanne K. Thompson, PhD, Lex W. Doyle, MD, & Terrie E. Inder, MBChB, MD. (2016) Breast Milk Feeding, Brain Development, and Neurocognitive Outcomes: A 7-Year Longitudinal Study in Infants Born at Less Than 30 Weeks' Gestation. The Journal of Pediatrics. DOI: http://dx.org/10.1016/j.jpeds.2016.06.045
- July 29, 2016
- 11:22 AM
- 19 views
Elite Cyclists and Brain Fatigue Resistance
by William Yates, M.D. in Brain Posts
In a Brain Post from 2012 I reviewed a study of fatigue in elite athletic performance. This study supported a key role in the brain insula in regulating the perception of exercise-induced fatigue. You can access this post by clicking HERE.An update on this topic was recently published in PloS One by a research team in Australia.This study compared performance on a cognitive task after extreme 20 minute cycling time trial. Professional cyclists were compared to recreational cyclists on the Stroop........ Read more »
Martin K, Staiano W, Menaspà P, Hennessey T, Marcora S, Keegan R, Thompson KG, Martin D, Halson S, & Rattray B. (2016) Superior Inhibitory Control and Resistance to Mental Fatigue in Professional Road Cyclists. PloS one, 11(7). PMID: 27441380
- July 28, 2016
- 03:23 PM
- 52 views
Why do antidepressants take so long to work?
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Medication roulette, if you have ever had to deal with depression or other types of mental illness you know what I'm talking about. You take a pill that could help or could cause all sorts of horrid side effects. You cross your fingers as you take that first pill and in the 4-6 weeks it takes to start working you cross your fingers, hope, wish and probably even dread the outcome. But why does it take so long for antidepressants to start working in the first place and what could be done to c........ Read more »
Erb, S., Schappi, J., & Rasenick, M. (2016) Antidepressants Accumulate in Lipid Rafts Independent of Monoamine Transporters to Modulate Redistribution of the G protein, Gα . Journal of Biological Chemistry. DOI: 10.1074/jbc.M116.727263
- July 27, 2016
- 03:39 PM
- 82 views
Common brain changes found in children with autism, ADHD and OCD
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
A team of Toronto scientists has found similarities in brain impairments in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). The study involved brain imaging of white matter in 200 children with autism, ADHD, OCD or no diagnosis.
... Read more »
Ameis, S., Lerch, J., Taylor, M., Lee, W., Viviano, J., Pipitone, J., Nazeri, A., Croarkin, P., Voineskos, A., Lai, M.... (2016) A Diffusion Tensor Imaging Study in Children With ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorder, OCD, and Matched Controls: Distinct and Non-Distinct White Matter Disruption and Dimensional Brain-Behavior Relationships. American Journal of Psychiatry. DOI: 10.1176/appi.ajp.2016.15111435
- July 27, 2016
- 09:49 AM
- 79 views
The Myth of Human Adult Neurogenesis?
by Neuroskeptic in Neuroskeptic_Discover
In a new paper that could prove explosive, Australian neuropathologists C. V. Dennis and colleagues report that they found very little evidence for adult neurogenesis in humans.
In recent years, the idea that neurogenesis - the production of new neurons - occurs in specific regions of the adult brain has become widely accepted, and much discussed. Disruptions to neurogenesis have been proposed to play a role in stress, depression, and other disorders.
However, Dennis et al. say that ne... Read more »
Dennis CV, Suh LS, Rodriguez ML, Kril JJ, & Sutherland GT. (2016) Human adult neurogenesis across the ages: An immunohistochemical study. Neuropathology and applied neurobiology. PMID: 27424496
- July 26, 2016
- 04:22 PM
- 114 views
The mysterious fart
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Everyone does it ...no, not poop, but fart. Passing gas, fuming, crop dusting, cracking a rat -- no matter what you call it -- everyone fart, but why? Researchers have published an article devoted to the review of gaseous neurotransmitters of microbial origin and their role in the human body.
... Read more »
Oleskin, A., & Shenderov, B. (2016) Neuromodulatory effects and targets of the SCFAs and gasotransmitters produced by the human symbiotic microbiota. Microbial Ecology in Health . DOI: 10.3402/mehd.v27.30971
- July 24, 2016
- 03:29 PM
- 122 views
Researchers temporarily turn off brain area to better understand function
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Capitalizing on experimental genetic techniques, researchers have demonstrated that temporarily turning off an area of the brain changes patterns of activity across much of the remaining brain. The research suggests that alterations in the functional connectivity of the brain in humans may be used to determine the sites of pathology in complex disorders such as schizophrenia and autism.
... Read more »
Grayson, D., Bliss-Moreau, E., Machado, C., Bennett, J., Shen, K., Grant, K., Fair, D., & Amaral, D. (2016) The Rhesus Monkey Connectome Predicts Disrupted Functional Networks Resulting from Pharmacogenetic Inactivation of the Amygdala. Neuron, 91(2), 453-466. DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2016.06.005
- July 23, 2016
- 05:30 PM
- 119 views
Brain activity and response to food cues differ in severely obese women
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
The brain's reward centers in severely obese women continue to respond to food cues even after they've eaten and are no longer hungry, in contrast to their lean counterparts. The study compared attitudes and the brain activity of 15 severely obese women (those with a body mass index greater than 35) and 15 lean women (those with a BMI under 25).
... Read more »
Puzziferri, N., Zigman, J., Thomas, B., Mihalakos, P., Gallagher, R., Lutter, M., Carmody, T., Lu, H., & Tamminga, C. (2016) Brain imaging demonstrates a reduced neural impact of eating in obesity. Obesity, 24(4), 829-836. DOI: 10.1002/oby.21424
- July 23, 2016
- 09:41 AM
- 122 views
A New Map of the Brain: What Does It Mean?
by Neuroskeptic in Neuroskeptic_Discover
A new Nature paper has earned a lot of media attention, unusually given that it's a fairly technical and 'basic' piece of neuroscience. In the paper, researchers Matthew F. Glasser and colleagues present a new parcellation (or map) of the human cerebral cortex, breaking the cortex down into 180 areas per hemisphere - many more than conventional maps.
But is this, as Nature dubbed it, "the ultimate brain map"?
To generate their map, Glasser et al. first downloaded 210 people's data from... Read more »
Glasser MF, Coalson TS, Robinson EC, Hacker CD, Harwell J, Yacoub E, Ugurbil K, Andersson J, Beckmann CF, Jenkinson M.... (2016) A multi-modal parcellation of human cerebral cortex. Nature. PMID: 27437579
- July 20, 2016
- 04:02 PM
- 149 views
How our brain puts the world in order
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
The world around is complex and changing constantly. To put it in order, we devise categories into which we sort new concepts. To do this we apply different strategies. A team of researchers wanted to find out which areas of the brain regulate these strategies. The results of their study using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) show that there are indeed particular brain areas, which become active when a certain strategy of categorisation is applied.
... Read more »
Lech, R., Güntürkün, O., & Suchan, B. (2016) An interplay of fusiform gyrus and hippocampus enables prototype- and exemplar-based category learning. Behavioural Brain Research, 239-246. DOI: 10.1016/j.bbr.2016.05.049
- July 19, 2016
- 04:08 PM
- 116 views
Protein found to bolster growth of damaged muscle tissue
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Biologists have found that a protein that plays a key role in the lives of stem cells can bolster the growth of damaged muscle tissue, a step that could potentially contribute to treatments for muscle degeneration caused by old age and diseases such as muscular dystrophy. The results show that a particular type of protein called integrin is present on the stem cell surface and used by stem cells to interact with, or "sense" their surroundings.
... Read more »
Rozo, M., Li, L., & Fan, C. (2016) Targeting β1-integrin signaling enhances regeneration in aged and dystrophic muscle in mice. Nature Medicine. DOI: 10.1038/nm.4116
- July 19, 2016
- 03:17 PM
- 39 views
Can Ultrasound Diagnose Autism?
by Neuroskeptic in Neuroskeptic_Discover
A paper makes the remarkable claim that autism could be detected through the use of ultrasound to peer beneath the skull. This paper is from 2014, but it just came to my attention.
The authors of the piece, James Jeffrey Bradstreet, Stefania Pacini and Marco Ruggiero, studied 23 children with autism and 15 control children, who were unaffected siblings of the autistic group. Using ultrasound, the authors looked under the skull overlaying the brain's temporal cortex. The ultrasound reveale... Read more »
Bradstreet JJ, Pacini S, & Ruggiero M. (2014) A New Methodology of Viewing Extra-Axial Fluid and Cortical Abnormalities in Children with Autism via Transcranial Ultrasonography. Frontiers in human neuroscience, 934. PMID: 24459462
- July 18, 2016
- 03:20 PM
- 158 views
Secrets of the human brain unlocked
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Human intelligence is being defined and measured for the first time ever. Researchers have been recently undertaken to quantify the brain's dynamic functions, and identify how different parts of the brain interact with each other at different times - namely, to discover how intellect works.
... Read more »
Zhang, J., Cheng, W., Liu, Z., Zhang, K., Lei, X., Yao, Y., Becker, B., Liu, Y., Kendrick, K., Lu, G.... (2016) Neural, electrophysiological and anatomical basis of brain-network variability and its characteristic changes in mental disorders. Brain. DOI: 10.1093/brain/aww143
- July 17, 2016
- 03:08 PM
- 136 views
Specialized neurons in emotional memory play important role in fear
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Fear memory encoding, the process responsible for persistent reactions to trauma-associated cues, is influenced by a sparse but potent population of inhibitory cells called parvalbumin-interneurons (PV-INs) in the amygdala, according to a new study.
... Read more »
Lucas, E., Jegarl, A., Morishita, H., & Clem, R. (2016) Multimodal and Site-Specific Plasticity of Amygdala Parvalbumin Interneurons after Fear Learning. Neuron. DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2016.06.032
- July 17, 2016
- 06:24 AM
- 129 views
Know your brain: Periaqueductal gray
by neurosci in Neuroscientifically Challenged
Where is the periaqueductal gray?
The periaqueductal gray, or PAG, is an area of gray matter found in the midbrain. The PAG surrounds the cerebral aqueduct (hence the name periaqueductal) and occupies a column of brainstem that stretches about 14 mm long. There are no obvious visible anatomical divisions within the PAG, but researchers have divided the PAG into four columns based on differences in connectivity and function: the dorsomedial, dorsolater........ Read more »
Behbehani, M. (1995) Functional characteristics of the midbrain periaqueductal gray. Progress in Neurobiology, 46(6), 575-605. DOI: 10.1016/0301-0082(95)00009-K
- July 16, 2016
- 04:45 PM
- 150 views
Reopening avenues for attacking ALS
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Researchers have found evidence that bone marrow transplantation may one day be beneficial to a subset of patients suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a fatal neurodegenerative disorder more commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease.
... Read more »
Burberry, A., Suzuki, N., Wang, J., Moccia, R., Mordes, D., Stewart, M., Suzuki-Uematsu, S., Ghosh, S., Singh, A., Merkle, F.... (2016) Loss-of-function mutations in the C9ORF72 mouse ortholog cause fatal autoimmune disease. Science Translational Medicine, 8(347), 347-347. DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.aaf6038
- July 15, 2016
- 02:24 PM
- 186 views
Repeated stimulation treatment can restore movement to paralyzed muscles
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Conducted at the BioMag laboratory at the Helsinki University Hospital, a new patient study could open a new opportunity to rehabilitate patients with spinal cord damage. In a new study which two patients with spinal cord injuries received a form of treatment that combined transcranial magnetic stimulation with simultaneous peripheral nerve stimulation given repeatedly for nearly six months.
... Read more »
Shulga, A., Lioumis, P., Zubareva, A., Brandstack, N., Kuusela, L., Kirveskari, E., Savolainen, S., Ylinen, A., & Mäkelä, J. (2016) Long-term paired associative stimulation can restore voluntary control over paralyzed muscles in incomplete chronic spinal cord injury patients. Spinal Cord Series and Cases, 16016. DOI: 10.1038/scsandc.2016.16
- July 14, 2016
- 11:15 AM
- 170 views
Does Sugar Really Fuel Willpower?
by Neuroskeptic in Neuroskeptic_Discover
Another prominent psychology theory has come under scrutiny by researchers who say the published results look unrealistic.
In a new paper, Miguel A. Vadillo et al. take aim at the idea that the body's reserves of willpower rely on glucose.
The background here is the 'ego depletion' model, a psychological theory which holds that self-control is effortful and draws on a limited resource, which can eventually be depleted if it's overused. Many researchers have proposed that glucose is thi... Read more »
Vadillo, M., Gold, N., & Osman, M. (2016) The Bitter Truth About Sugar and Willpower: The Limited Evidential Value of the Glucose Model of Ego Depletion. Psychological Science. DOI: 10.1177/0956797616654911
- July 13, 2016
- 03:33 PM
- 198 views
"Shocking" new role of the immune system: Controlling social interaction
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
In a startling discovery that raises fundamental questions about human behavior, researchers have determined that the immune system directly affects - and even controls - creatures' social behavior, such as their desire to interact with others. So could immune system problems contribute to an inability to have normal social interactions?
... Read more »
Filiano, A., Xu, Y., Tustison, N., Marsh, R., Baker, W., Smirnov, I., Overall, C., Gadani, S., Turner, S., Weng, Z.... (2016) Unexpected role of interferon-γ in regulating neuronal connectivity and social behaviour. Nature. DOI: 10.1038/nature18626
- July 13, 2016
- 01:00 AM
- 136 views
Another one bites the dust?
by Henkjan Honing in Music Matters
The music theory literature has been suggesting it for a long time: the idea that simultaneous sounding tones with frequency relationships that are low integer multiples, like 1:2 (octave) or 3:2 (a perfect fifth), are determinant of how listeners perceive consonance. It is an idea that is often related to the overtone structure of natural sounds (such as the voice or string instruments) suggesting that musical harmony is reflective or even a result of the acoustic structure that is found in nat........ Read more »
Honing, H., ten Cate, C., Peretz, I., & Trehub, S. (2015) Without it no music: cognition, biology and evolution of musicality. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 370(1664), 20140088-20140088. DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2014.0088
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