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Check and balance for neuron activity provides insight into schizophrenia, seizures

Two genes important for human development and implicated in cancer and schizophrenia also help keep a healthy balance between excitation and inhibition of brain cells, researchers say.

24 May 2007

Pure oxygen harms the brain

A paramedic or doctor plops a mask over the face of a person struggling to breathe and begins dispensing pure oxygen.

24 May 2007

Simple equations track Listeria trails

Circles, slaloms, figure eights, and loop-the-loops , biologists studying the motion of Listeria monocytogenes sensed that these paths were related, but they didn't have a good way to define what fit in and what didn't.

16 May 2007

The Phi Complex as a neuromarker of human social coordination

Researchers from Florida Atlantic University (FAU) have been able to identify neural signatures of effective, real-time coordination between people in one of the first studies in the field of social neuroscience to actually record, measure and analyze both behavior and brain activity simultaneously in two interacting humans.

16 May 2007

Distant ancestor less mentally advanced than expected

A surprisingly complete fossil skull of an ancient relative of humans, apes and monkeys bears striking evidence that our remote ancestor was less mentally advanced than expected by about 29 million years ago.

15 May 2007

Gene mutation linked to cognition is found only in humans

The human and chimpanzee genomes vary by just 1.2 percent, yet there is a considerable difference in the mental and linguistic capabilities between the two species.

9 May 2007

New compounds promising candidates for neurodegenerative disease drug development

Scientists have developed a novel strategy for tackling neurodegenerative diseases such as Huntington's disease: encouraging an individual's own cells to "eat" the malformed proteins that lead to the disease.

8 May 2007

Multitasking mental cells

In the mid-1990s, scientists at the University of Parma, in Italy, made a discovery so novel that it shifted the way psychologists discuss the brain. After researchers implanted electrodes into the heads of monkeys, they noticed a burst of activity in the premotor cortex when the animals clutched a piece of food.

8 May 2007

Children with autism cannot read facial expressions

When we have a conversation with someone, we not only hear what they say, we see what they say.

8 May 2007

Noise effects in ion channels in the brain are much larger than previously assumed

Addressing a current issue in neuroscience, Aldo Faisal and Simon Laughlin from Cambridge University investigate the reliability of thin axons for transmitting information.

4 May 2007

Scientists work out mechanism underlying asymmetric cell division in nematode worms

When a cell divides, normally the result is two identical daughter cells. In some cases however, cell division leads to two cells with different properties. This is called asymmetric cell division and plays an important role in embryonic development and the self-renewal of stem cells.

4 May 2007

Backup brain region compensates for stroke

Researchers have pinpointed in humans how a "backup" brain region springs into action to compensate for disruption of a primary functional area, as happens during stroke.

4 May 2007

Cause of gender differences in high blood pressure and related kidney disease

While men and women both get high blood pressure and related kidney disease, the path to get there is shorter, steeper and just different for men, researchers say.

4 May 2007

Gulf War veterans with health symptoms show differences in brain structures

Veterans of the first Gulf War who returned with multiple health symptom complaints show significant differences in brain structures from their fellow returnees without high numbers of health symptoms, according to research that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's 59th Annual Meeting in Boston, April 28 ,May 5, 2007.

2 May 2007

Simvastatin may help sufferers with Alzheimer's

Treatment with Simvastatin, one of the statin drugs widely used for lowering cholesterol in humans, significantly improved spatial memory - how to navigate a water maze - in mice genetically bred to have an Alzheimer's like disease.

1 May 2007

Heavy use of cannabis triggers psychotic illnesses

Scientists in the UK say the heavy consumption of the drug cannabis may trigger psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia.

30 Apr 2007

New prosthetic limbs allow for eight degrees of freedom

An international team led by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md., has developed a prototype of the first fully integrated prosthetic arm that can be controlled naturally and provide sensory feedback, and allows for eight degrees of Freedom -- a level of control far beyond the current state of the art for prosthetic limbs.

27 Apr 2007