A positive outlook on life might lower your risk of having a stroke, according to new research reported in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.
In an observational study, a nationally representative group of 6,044 adults over age 50 rated their optimism levels on a 16-point scale. Each point increase in optimism corresponded to a 9 percent decrease in acute stroke risk over a two-year follow-up period.
COLUMBUS, Ohio – The development of a new cell-culture system that mimics how specific nerve cell fibers in the brain become coated with protective myelin opens up new avenues of research about multiple sclerosis. Initial findings suggest that myelin regulates a key protein involved in sending long-distance signals.
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an autoimmune disease characterized by damage to the myelin sheath surrounding nerve fibers. The cause remains unknown, and it is a chronic illness affecting the central nervous system that has no cure.
COLUMBIA, Mo. ¬— While some members of Congress and others are trying to repeal the healthcare reform law that was passed in 2010, known as the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," medical providers have begun to implement requirements as the law slowly phases in over the next several years.
Gardeners know that some trees require regular pruning: some of their branches have to be cut so that others can grow stronger. The same is true of the developing brain: cells called microglia prune the connections between neurons, shaping how the brain is wired, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Monterotondo, Italy, discovered. Published online today in Science, the findings could one day help understand neurodevelopmental disorders like autism.
LOS ANGELES (July 20, 2011) –Neurologist Michele Tagliati, MD, director of the Movement Disorders Program at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, served on an elite international task force commissioned by the Movement Disorder Society to provide insights and guidance on deep brain stimulation for dystonia, an uncommon condition that causes sustained, sometimes crippling muscle contractions.
RIVERSIDE, Calif. (www.ucr.edu) -- Do people believe good and bad luck can be washed away?
Yes, according to an advanced online publication in the Journal of Experimental Psychology that was co-authored by Rami Zwick, a University of California, Riverside marketing professor in the School of Business Administration.
Today, the body of an ordinary family car consists of 193 different types of steel. The steel for each part of the car has been carefully selected and optimised. It is important, for example, that all parts are as light as possible because of the fuel consumption, whereas other parts of the car have to be super strong in order to protect passengers in a collision.
Two-thirds of people with severe and otherwise untreatable epilepsy were completely cured of their frequent seizures after undergoing neurosurgery at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center, according to a new study that examined 143 of these patients two years after their operations.
The new study not only shows the promise of this type of neurosurgery at treating severe epilepsy, it also highlights how research into brain imaging may help to further improve results for people who have such operations.
Tel Aviv — Circadian rhythms — the natural cycle that dictates our biological processes over a 24-hour day — does more than tell us when to sleep or wake. Disruptions in the cycle are also associated with depression, problems with weight control, jet lag and more. Now Prof. Yoav Gothilf of Tel Aviv University's Department of Neurobiology at the George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences is looking to the common zebrafish to learn more about how the human circadian system functions.
Recently, optogenetics, which controls the activity of neuron using the light-activated protein, has been getting a lot of attention. This light-activated protein works like a switch of neurons by sensing specific color of light. This time, Associate Professor Akihiro YAMANAKA and Dr. Tomomi Tsunematsu from National Institute for Physiological Sciences (NIPS), succeeded in suppressing only the activity of the orexin neurons in the mice's brains (hypothalamus) when the optical switch was on, using the light-activated protein, halorhodopsin (eNpHR).
Researchers at Case Western Reserve University have developed a computer modeling method to accurately predict how a peripheral nerve axon responds to electrical stimuli, slashing the complex work from an inhibitory weeks-long process to just a few seconds.
The method, which enables efficient evaluation of a nerve's response to millions of electrode designs, is an integral step toward building more accurate and capable electrodes to stimulate nerves and thereby enable people with paralysis or amputated limbs better control of movement.
CHICAGO --- For hundreds of thousands of people, injuring a muscle through an accident like falling off a bike or having surgery can result in a strange and serious complication. Their muscles start growing bones.
PASADENA, Calif.—Artificial intelligence has been the inspiration for countless books and movies, as well as the aspiration of countless scientists and engineers. Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have now taken a major step toward creating artificial intelligence—not in a robot or a silicon chip, but in a test tube. The researchers are the first to have made an artificial neural network out of DNA, creating a circuit of interacting molecules that can recall memories based on incomplete patterns, just as a brain can.
Dr. Ed Ruthazer is a mapmaker but, his landscape is the developing brain - specifically the neuronal circuitry, which is the network of connections between nerve cells. His research at The Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital – The Neuro at McGill University, reveals the brain as a dynamic landscape where connections between nerves are plastic, changing and adapting to the demands of the environment. Dr. Ruthazer is the winner of the inaugural Young Investigator Award from the Canadian Association for Neuroscience, which recognizes outstanding research achievements.
(CHICAGO) – Children and adults with social withdrawal due to Fragile X syndrome, the most common cause of inherited intellectual disability and the most common known single gene cause of autism, may benefit from an experimental drug under study by pediatric neurologists at Rush Children's Hospital at Rush University Medical Center.
Rush is the only site in Illinois and one of 21 hospitals in the U.S. participating in the trial for Fragile X.