Neuroimaging News and Research

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High-density diffuse optical tomography helps scan infant brains

Researchers hoping to better understand the development of the infant brain have long been stymied by a formidable obstacle: babies just don't want to sit still for brain scans.

22 Aug 2007

UIC receives $9.6 million grant for autism research

The University of Illinois at Chicago has been awarded a $9.6 million, five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health to establish an Autism Center of Excellence.

7 Aug 2007

18 to 25 percent of women suffer from migraines

For every man with a migraine, three women are struck by the severe headaches that often come with nausea, sensitivity to light and sound, and aura.

6 Aug 2007

Link between increased white matter and poor motor skills in children with autism

A study published in the August issue of the journal Brain demonstrates, for the first time, an association between increased white matter volume and functional impairment in children with autism.

1 Aug 2007

Brain regions that regulate different aspects of behavior may affect an adolescent's response to peer influence

Brain regions that regulate different aspects of behavior are more interconnected in children with high resistance to peer influence than those with low resistance, according to a new study published in the July 25 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience .

27 Jul 2007

Resisting peer pressure all in the brain

The capacity to resist peer pressure in early adolescence may depend on the strength of connections between certain areas of the brain, according to a study carried out by University of Nottingham researchers.

26 Jul 2007

Prenatal alcohol exposure alters brain activity in the frontal-striatal areas

Heavy prenatal alcohol exposure does not always lead to fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS); sometimes it can lead to cognitive and behavioral deficits in the absence of craniofacial features needed to make an FAS diagnosis.

25 Jul 2007

Brain lesions may be sign of more widespread disease in the brain

Lesions commonly seen on MRI in the brains of older patients may be a sign of potentially more extensive injury to the brain tissue, according to a recent study conducted by researchers at the Duke University Medical Center, in Durham, NC.

10 Jul 2007

New criteria for probable Alzheimer's disease

An international group of Alzheimer's disease (AD) experts have proposed new criteria for the reasearch diagnosis of the condition, as they argue the existing criteria are out of date due to unprecedented growth of scientific knowledge in the field. The proposal is put forward in a Position Paper published early Online and in the August edition of The Lancet Neurology.

9 Jul 2007

People with damage to blood vessels in the brain more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease

A recent study in Journal of Neuroimaging suggests that cognitively normal adults exhibiting atrophy of their temporal lobe or damage to blood vessels in the brain are more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease.

9 Jul 2007

Training autistic brains to recognize visual and vocal cues

To understand the meaning of a conversation, kids automatically do what adults do - besides processing the meaning of words, they unconsciously "read" the expression on a person's face and listen to their tone of voice, then integrate that information with the context at hand to discern meaning, be it humor, anger, irony or straightforwardness.

28 Jun 2007

Research into Alzheimer’s disease and dementia wins Queen’s doctor major award

A prestigious scholarship award made for the first time ever outside the United States has been won by a Queen's University medical graduate.

26 Jun 2007

Breakdown of myelin may be the cause of Huntington's disease

Last month, Dr. George Bartzokis, director of the UCLA Memory Disorders and Alzheimer's Disease Clinic, suggested in the journal Alzheimer's & Dementia that the breakdown of a type of myelin that develops late in life promotes the buildup of toxic amyloid plaques long associated with Alzheimer's disease.

16 Jun 2007

Myelin and Huntington's disease

14 Jun 2007

Early results from Alzheimer's neuroimaging studies could speed research

Disease researchers may be able to reduce the time and expense associated with clinical trials, according to early results from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI), a public-private research partnership organized by the National Institutes of Health.

14 Jun 2007

Combining brain scans and behavioral tests aids early identification of at-risk readers

Taken together, functional brain scans and tests of reading skills strongly predict which children will have ongoing reading problems.

14 Jun 2007

Novel pathways and markers for diagnosis and treatment of bipolar disorder

Looking into the brain is yielding vital clues to understanding, diagnosing and treating bipolar disorder, according to findings being presented at the Seventh International Conference on Bipolar Disorder.

8 Jun 2007

Fictive learning may play a role in addiction

"What might have been" or fictive learning affects the brain and plays an important role in the choices individuals make, and may play a role in addiction, said Baylor College of Medicine researchers and others in a report that appears online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

16 May 2007

VA should revise its methods for evaluating post-traumatic stress disorder

To ensure more consistent and appropriate disability compensation for veterans, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) needs to revise how it evaluates former military personnel for service-connected post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and determines the payment amounts they merit, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine and National Research Council.

9 May 2007

Study provides new understanding of excessive gambling

People process information about financial loss through mechanisms in the brain similar to those used for processing physical pain, according to a new imaging study.

8 May 2007