Neuroscience

Scientists at Karolinska Institutet and Helsinki University are reporting that DCDC2, a gene linked to dyslexia, has a surprising biological function: it controls cilia, the antenna-like projections that cells use to communicate.  Dyslexia is largely hereditary and linked to a number of genes, the functions of which are largely unknown. The new study shows that DCDC2 is involved in regulating the signalling of cilia in brain neurons.  Cilia are hair-like structures that project from the surface of most cells. Their purpose has long remained something of a mystery, but recent…

Diana Deutsch, professor of Psychology at the University of California, San Diego (see webpage), is well-known for her work on perception and memory for sounds. She has discovered numerous auditory illusions, one of them know as 'phantom words', a sequence of repeating words or phrases that arise simultaneously from different regions of space, which leads listeners to hear words and phrases that are not really there. In other words, "The brain is constantly attempting to find meaning in things, even where there is no meaning. This can often lead us to experience illusions. Just as, when we…

It's difficult to know what you are thinking -- or what is happening in your own brain -- as you loose consciousness. There are many instances where this loss might happen, including getting whacked up side the head, inhaling a large volume of non-medically-inspired drugs, or, to the preference of many, falling into a deep sleep during anesthesia before an invasive operation. Many research groups have studied the brain during its influence to anesthetic drugs, in particular Stuart Hameroff from the University of Arizona. The brain seems to become almost numb and nearly shuts…

Lady Gaga is a marketing-fueled pop music phenomenon.   If you exclude her music, she can do no wrong, and every appearance, even a walk through an airport, is carefully choreographed.   She knows her audience. But a Little Monster could help create the next Lady Gaga in a more direct way.  A new study suggests that the brain activity of teens while they are listening to new songs may help predict the popularity of those songs. In 2006, the lab of Gregory Berns, a neuroeconomist(!) and director of Emory's Center for Neuropolicy selected 120 songs from MySpace pages, all of…

A cap that literally cools the brain during sleep may be an effective insomnia treatment, according to new research. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine says that chronic insomnia, symptoms that last for at least a month, affects about 10 percent of adults.  Most often insomnia is a "comorbid" disorder, occurring with another medical illness, mental disorder or sleep disorder, or associated with certain medications or substances. Fewer people with insomnia are considered to have primary insomnia, which is defined as a difficulty falling asleep or maintaining sleep in the absence of…

Baseball coaches often use traditional metrics for managerial decisions, like batting results against specific pitchers, performance in certain park configurations and whether they bat from the left or right side in making strategic lineup decisions. Maybe some day they can also think about what 'sleep type' their players are. New research presented today at SLEEP 2011 indicates that players who were 'morning types' had a higher batting average (.267) than players who were 'evening types' (.259) in day games, those that started before 2 p.m. However, evening types, or night owls as they are…

The American Academy of Pediatrics recently recommended that screening for autism be incorporated into routine physician check-ups, even if no concern has been raised by the parents. Such routine screening of all children for autism gets a thumbs down from researchers at McMaster University in a Pediatrics study.  The researchers say there is "not enough sound evidence to support the implementation of a routine population-based screening program for autism." Not only are good screening tools and effective treatments lacking but there is no evidence yet that routine screening does more…

It is generally accepted that pathological violence is a combination of factors, both biological and psychological, but brain studies of violent criminals haven't revealed much. However, a new brain imaging study suggests that men with a history of violent behavior may have greater gray matter volume in certain brain areas, whereas men with a history of substance use disorders may have reduced gray matter volume in other brain areas. The researchers compared violent offenders, both with substance use disorders (SUDs)(12) and without(12), along with nonviolent men, both with (13) and without…

On June 6th 2005, EPFL (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland) and IBM launched the Blue Brain Project, an ambitious attempt at simulating a mammalian brain down to a molecular level. Headed by professor Henry Markram, the Blue Brain Project, along with a dozen international partners, has recently proposed the Human Brain Project, with as ultimate goal the simulation of a human brain. Recently, the group has been awarded a grant of roughly 1.4 Euros by the European Commission to formulate a detailed research proposal. If the decision of the European Commission (expected…

The astrocyte, most common cell in the human nervous system, is finally getting some respect; researchers have used embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells to cultivate the star-shaped astrocyte. Not just putty in the brain and spinal cord The ability to make large, uniform batches of astrocytes, explains stem cell researcher Su-Chun Zhang, opens a new avenue to more fully understanding the functional roles of the brain's most commonplace cell, as well as its involvement in a host of central nervous system disorders ranging from headaches to dementia. What's more, the ability to culture…