Cortex News and Research

RSS

Babies' brains process language the same way as adults

Babies, even those too young to talk, can understand many of the words that adults are saying - and their brains process them in a grown-up way.

7 Jan 2011

Radiosurgery may bring improvement for patients with extremely severe -compulsive disorder

For patients with extremely severe -compulsive disorder (OCD), a procedure called radiosurgery may bring improvement when other treatments have failed, according to a study in the January issue of Neurosurgery, official journal of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.

7 Jan 2011

Mutated TDP-43 can cause neurons to die: Study

Lou Gehrig's disease, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and frontotemporal lobar degeneration are characterized by protein clumps in brain and spinal-cord cells that include an RNA-binding protein called TDP-43. This protein is the major building block of the lesions formed by these clumps.

6 Jan 2011

Study on aberrant cellular localization in the brain

Normally, cortical nerve cells or neurons reside in the brain's gray matter with only a few scattered neurons in the white matter, but some people with schizophrenia have a higher number of neurons in the white matter. Neuronal migration errors may arise in schizophrenia as a consequence of both genetic and environmental factors.

5 Jan 2011

Bupropion and varenicline help curb cigarette craving

The smoking cessation medications bupropion and varenicline may both be associated with changes in the way the brain reacts to smoking cues, making it easier for patients to resist cravings, according to two reports posted online today that will appear in the May print issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

4 Jan 2011

General anaesthesia brings reversible coma and not sleep: Study

Anaesthesia has been one of the greatest gifts of science and use of general anaesthesia is a routine part of surgical operations at hospitals and medical facilities around the world. However precise biological mechanisms of the drugs’ effects on the brain are only now being analyzed. In a review article published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine, scientists have tried to analyze a range of disciplines, including neuroscience and sleep medicine to understand how anaesthesia actually works.

2 Jan 2011

Neuroscientists say that general anesthesia is a reversible coma

The brain under general anesthesia isn't "asleep" as surgery patients are often told -- it is placed into a state that is a reversible coma, according to three neuroscientists who have published an extensive review of general anesthesia, sleep and coma, in the Dec. 30 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.

30 Dec 2010

Exposure to persistent organic pollutants alters cortisol level in blood

Karin E Zimmer's PhD research shows that persistent organic pollutants (POPs), such as PCB and mixtures of different POPs, affect the way the adrenal cortex functions and thereby the synthesis of the stress hormone cortisol.

28 Dec 2010

Brain regions that 'fire up' due to suppression of automatic behaviour

Research from York University is revealing which regions in the brain "fire up" when we suppress an automatic behaviour such as the urge to look at other people as we enter an elevator.

23 Dec 2010

New research sheds light on how neurons make connections with one another

Newly published research led by Professor Z. Josh Huang, Ph.D., of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory sheds important new light on how neurons in the developing brain make connections with one another.

22 Dec 2010

Hyperpriming in early stages of Alzheimer's disease explained

The capacity to remember that a zebra has stripes, or that a giraffe is a four-legged mammal, is known as semantic memory. It allows us to assign meaning to words and to recall general knowledge and concepts that we have learned. The deterioration of these capacities is a defining feature of semantic dementia and can also occur in Alzheimer's disease.

20 Dec 2010

Improved brain-machine technologies

A new study published in the Dec 15 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience found that monkeys were able to move thought-controlled computer cursors more quickly and accurately when provided with additional sensory feedback.

19 Dec 2010

Perirhinal cortex critical for forming unconscious conceptual memories

A small area deep in the brain called the perirhinal cortex is critical for forming unconscious conceptual memories, researchers at the UC Davis Center for Mind and Brain have found.

16 Dec 2010

Researchers discover newborn's brain respond strongly to mother's voice

A mother's voice will preferentially activate the parts of the brain responsible for language learning, say researchers from the University of Montreal and the Sainte-Justine University Hospital Research Centre.

16 Dec 2010

New study shows how meditators don't ponder pain

Zen meditation has many health benefits, including a reduced sensitivity to pain. According to new research from the Universit- de Montr-al, meditators do feel pain but they simply don't dwell on it as much. These findings, published in the month's issue of Pain, may have implications for chronic pain sufferers, such as those with arthritis, back pain or cancer.

9 Dec 2010

ADHD, developmental RD have common genetic influences: Study

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and developmental reading disability are complex childhood disorders that frequently occur together; if a child is experiencing trouble with reading, symptoms of ADHD are often also present.

9 Dec 2010

AHNPs may serve as effective treatment for epilepsy and other disorders with altered neuronal circuitry

Epilepsy research is reaching beyond improving the means for quelling symptoms to the exploration of potential modalities for correcting or reversing alterations in neural function that underlay some forms of the disorder.

8 Dec 2010

Scientists show how brain's architecture makes our view of world unique

Wellcome Trust scientists have shown for the first time that exactly how we see our environment depends on the size of the visual part of our brain.

6 Dec 2010

Robotics and machine-brain interface may benefit paraplegics

A ballet dancer grasps her partner's hand to connect for a pas de deux. Later that night, in the dark, she reaches for her calf to massage a sore spot. Her brain is using different "maps" to plan for each of these movements, according to a new study at UC Santa Barbara.

4 Dec 2010