Brain News and Research

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The human brain is the center of the human nervous system and is a highly complex organ. Enclosed in the cranium, it has the same general structure as the brains of other mammals, but is over three times as large as the brain of a typical mammal with an equivalent body size.

Personality traits linked with individual's susceptibility to placebo effect from pain medicines

Personality traits might do more than help you win a popularity contest. According to new University of Michigan-led neuroscience research, co-authored by University of Maryland (UM) School of Dentistry Dean Christian S. Stohler, DMD, DrMedDent, such traits also might make you more likely to get pain relief from a placebo - a fake medicine.

17 Nov 2012

New way to stimulate transplanted human stem cell-derived neurons into a rodent hippocampus

Researchers and patients look forward to the day when stem cells might be used to replace dying brain cells in Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative conditions. Scientists are currently able to make neurons and other brain cells from stem cells, but getting these neurons to properly function when transplanted to the host has proven to be more difficult.

17 Nov 2012

ACS Surgical Health Care Quality Forum New York focuses on methods to improve patient safety

Today the American College of Surgeons held the ACS Surgical Health Care Quality Forum New York, the 10th program in a series of events to drive national discussions on effective quality improvement methods that surgeons, physicians and hospitals are using to improve patient safety and reduce costs.

17 Nov 2012

Scientists discover new mode of action for enzymes immersed in cellular membranes

Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered a new mode of action for enzymes immersed in cellular membranes. Their experiments suggest that instead of recognizing and clipping proteins based on sequences of amino acids, these proteases' location within membranes gives them the unique ability to recognize and cut proteins with unstable structures.

17 Nov 2012

Study shows how Parkinson's spreads and leads to nerve cell death

Understanding how any disease progresses is one of the first and most important steps towards finding treatments to stop it. This has been the case for such brain-degenerating conditions as Alzheimer's disease. Now, after several years of incremental study, researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania have been able to piece together important steps in how Parkinson's disease (PD) spreads from cell to cell and leads to nerve cell death.

17 Nov 2012

Two studies investigate role of oxygen in cell transplantation

Two studies published in the current issue of Cell Transplantation, now freely available on-line, investigate the role of oxygen in cell transplantation.

17 Nov 2012

Researchers develop safe, feasible and robust co-culture system for hESC expansion

Researchers in Taiwan have developed a "safe, feasible and robust co-culture system" supplied by human umbilical cord mensenchymal stem cells (HUCMSCs) to feed the sustained culture used for human embryonic stem cell (hESC) expansion prior to cell transplantation.

17 Nov 2012

Scientists identify cell growth pathway that is unusually active in gliomas

Insights from a genetic condition that causes brain cancer are helping scientists better understand the most common type of brain tumor in children.

17 Nov 2012

Researchers analyze Brazilian mediums' cerebral blood flow during practice of psychography

Researchers at Thomas Jefferson University and the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil analyzed the cerebral blood flow (CBF) of Brazilian mediums during the practice of psychography, described as a form of writing whereby a deceased person or spirit is believed to write through the medium's hand.

17 Nov 2012

S100A4 protein triggers repair processes in the brain after injury

Researchers at the University of Copenhagen have found that a protein, known for causing cancer cells to spread around the body, is also one of the molecules that trigger repair processes in the brain.

17 Nov 2012

UGA research finds children with noncardiac chest pain have higher levels of anxiety

Psychological factors can have as much-or more-impact on pediatric chest pain as physical ones, a University of Georgia study found recently.

17 Nov 2012

Exposure to air pollution influences cognitive function in older adults: Study

Living in areas of high air pollution can lead to decreased cognitive function in older adults, according to new research presented in San Diego at The Gerontological Society of America's 65th Annual Scientific Meeting.

16 Nov 2012

Obstetric complications linked to NSS in schizophrenia

Patients with schizophrenia whose mothers experienced obstetric complications during pregnancy show more neurologic soft signs than those with mothers who did not experience such complications, researchers report.

16 Nov 2012

Periodicity Index limits variability when measuring restless legs

The Periodicity Index is a more stable measure of leg movements during sleep in restless legs syndrome than the widely used periodic leg movements index, investigators have found.

16 Nov 2012

Brain imaging distinguishes Parkinson’s subtypes

Patients with nontremor-dominant Parkinson’s disease show changes in brain activity that set them apart from tremor-dominant patients and from healthy controls, a study shows.

16 Nov 2012

Bradykinesia is ‘context-specific’ in Parkinson’s

Patients with Parkinson’s disease can make rapid responses to avoid adverse stimuli, but cannot speed up their actions to gain a reward, report UK researchers.

16 Nov 2012

Study links congenital kidney disease with neurodevelopmental disorders

About 10 percent of kids born with kidney defects have large alterations in their genomes known to be linked with neurodevelopmental delay and mental illness, a new study by Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC) researchers has shown.

16 Nov 2012

CLR01 effectively inhibits synaptotoxicity in mice with Alzheimer's

Last March, researchers at UCLA reported the development of a molecular compound called CLR01 that prevented toxic proteins associated with Parkinson's disease from binding together and killing the brain's neurons.

16 Nov 2012

New insights into how MSCs ‘traffic’ from the circulation into tissues

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), are a newly emerging cellular therapy being tested in approximately 250 clinical trials worldwide to help repair damaged tissues, such as injured heart muscle following a heart attack. The problem is that when culture-expanded MSCs are injected into the circulation, they have trouble gaining access to the inflamed tissues-exactly where their help is needed.

16 Nov 2012

New pathway appears to play a major role in information processing in the brain

Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have identified a new pathway that appears to play a major role in information processing in the brain. Their research also offers insight into how imbalances in this pathway could contribute to cognitive abnormalities in humans.

16 Nov 2012