Neuroscience

Anxiety-prone people can blame serotonin cleanup proteins gone awry in their amygdala, according to research in marmosets recently published in JNeurosci. Targeting the amygdala with anti-anxiety medication could provide quicker relief. The same event or set of life circumstances could send one person into the depths of anxiety or despair while leaving another unaffected. This distinction, called trait anxiety, arises from the proteins involved in serotonin signaling, a neurotransmitter implicated in anxiety and depression. Quah et al. measured the level of gene expression for genes encoding…

There is no question depression can have physical effects but it is unclear how much of depression is caused by biology and how much is psychology.  A new study finds there are increased amounts of an unmodified structural protein, called tubulin, in lipid rafts, fatty sections of a cell membrane, compared with non-depressed individuals. Tubulin is part of a protein complex that provides structure to cells. This complex also is involved in binding a specific protein called Gs alpha, or Gsa, which is a signaling molecule that conveys the action of neurotransmitters like serotonin.…

Brain volume changes during evolution have shown how modern human brains diverged from the brains of our closest primate cousin, the chimpanzee, and a new study takes that a step further. CT-scans of three-million-year old brain imprints inside fossil skulls of the species Australopithecus afarensis (famous for "Lucy" and "Selam" from Ethiopia's Afar region) reveals that while Lucy's species had an ape-like brain structure, the brain took longer to reach adult size, suggesting that infants may have had a longer dependence on caregivers, a human-like trait. To study brain growth and…

Though implicit bias - the belief that you are prejudiced, it's just a matter of degree - is controversial, that's only because it lacks scientific footing. A new study seeks to advance that. We all have likes and dislikes but when it becomes bias or prejudice is subjective. If you prefer dark haired men, does that mean you are prejudiced against redheads? It does, in things like the Implicit Association Test.  The new study hopes to make a compelling case for scientific proof of bias using the strength of alpha brain waves. The authors say those reveal if you are about to make a…

Drosophila flies lose long-term memory of a traumatic event when kept in the dark, and the authors of a new study link that to a specific molecular mechanism responsible.  Memories are difficult to erase but breakthroughs could be important for sufferers of trauma, because while most normal events won't be recalled even the same day, a particularly shocking event may be consolidated into our long-term memory, whereby new proteins are synthesized and the neuronal circuits in our brain are modified. Such memories may be devastating to a victim, potentially triggering post-traumatic…

We know the left and right side of our brain are specialized for cognitive abilities like language (left hemisphere) and the right hand. That functional lateralization is reflected by morphological asymmetry too. The left and right hemispheres differ subtly in brain anatomy, distribution of nerve cells, connectivity and even neurochemistry. It can be seen on endocasts. Most humans have a combination of a more projecting left occipital lobe (located in the back of the brain) with a more projecting right frontal lobe. Brain asymmetry is commonly interpreted as crucial for human brain function…

Having trouble sleeping? Nervous about an important interview? Smelling your partner’s worn clothing may help improve your sleep and calm your nerves. While it may sound strange to smell your partner’s clothing, these behaviors are surprisingly common. In one study, researchers asked participants if they had ever slept with or smelled their partners’ worn clothing during periods of separation. Over 80 per cent of women and 50 per cent of men reported they had intentionally smelled an absent partner’s clothing. Most of them said they did so because it made them feel relaxed or secure. Social…

An exploratory result, published in Military Medicine, finds that soldiers with traumatic brain injury are more likely than soldiers with other serious injuries to experience a range of mental health disorders. The retrospective analysis examined the cases of 4,980 military members who were severely injured during combat in Iraq and Afghanistan between 2002 and 2011. Nearly a third of them suffered moderate or severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). The study found that 71 percent of all the severely injured soldiers were diagnosed in follow-up care with at least one of five…

People can deny a lot of science without making a huge difference in their lives; no one will die if they deny evolution. Gravity, on the other hand, will kill you. You can't just jump off a building and deny it exists and expect a positive outcome. This unseen force dominates our entire lives so completely we forget it exists. We drop pencils and struggle to walk uphill and go on with our lives. How people account for this invisible influence while moving through the world was the subject of a recent experiment, and the results showed we regard it a lot differently when we can see it…

How did the most famous concept devised in neurobiology--the homunculus of neurosurgeon Wilder Penfield - originate? Some answers derive from assessing Penfield's archives at the Osler Library of McGill University, as well as the only known copy from which the beginnings of the homunculus may be traced--Edwin Boldrey's 1936 McGill master's degree thesis supervised by Penfield. The iconic homunculus was devised by Penfield as a teaching tool to aid memory, and was drawn by Hortense Cantlie, a medical illustrator at McGill. She rendered the complex idea simply for its first appearance in…