Brain

A landmark study led by North Carolina State University researchers shows that African-American seniors who have trouble falling asleep are at higher risk of having memory problems – raising the possibility that identifying and treating sleep difficulties in the elderly may help preserve their cognitive functioning. The study is the first to examine the link between sleep and cognitive functioning in older African-Americans.

The more alcohol an individual drinks, the smaller his or her total brain volume, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Neurology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Mayo Clinic researchers, as part of a nine-site study, helped discover the best of three currently-used treatments for convergence insufficiency in children. Convergence refers to the natural ability of the eyes to focus and align while viewing objects up close. Children with convergence insufficiency tend to have blurred or double vision or headaches and corresponding issues in reading and concentrating, which ultimately impact learning.

A majority of Parkinson's disease patients had insufficient levels of vitamin D in a new study from Emory University School of Medicine.

The fraction of Parkinson's patients with vitamin D insufficiency, 55 percent, was significantly more than patients with Alzheimer's disease (41 percent) or healthy elderly people (36 percent).

The results are published in the October issue of Archives of Neurology.

The finding adds to evidence that low vitamin D is associated with Parkinson's, says first author Marian Evatt, MD, assistant professor of neurology at Emory.

CINCINNATI – When it comes to embryo formation in the lowly fruit fly, a little molecular messiness actually leads to enhanced developmental precision, according to a study in the Oct. 14 Developmental Cell from Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center.

New research may help reveal why different parts of the brain can come under attack in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). According to a new study in mice with an MS-like disease, the brain's response to a protein produced by invading T cells dictates whether it's the spinal cord or cerebellum that comes under fire. The study—from researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore and Washington University in St. Louis—will be published online on October 13th in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.

Scientists at Bonn and Düsseldorf Universities have discovered an important hair-loss gene. During their study, the researchers investigated over 500,000 positions in the human genome, and found a gene variant which occurs clearly more frequently in bald men than in control persons. The results are to be published in the November issue of the journal Nature Genetics (online publication on October 12th 2008 18:00 London time, doi: 10.1038/ng.228).

WASHINGTON – OCTOBER 12, 2008 – Research presented at the 20th annual Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics (TCT) scientific symposium, sponsored by the Cardiovascular Research Foundation (CRF), found that coronary heart disease (CHD) symptoms presented in the context of a stressful life event were identified as psychogenic in origin when presented by women and organic in origin when presented by men. The study could help explain why there is often a delay in the assessment of women with heart disease.

EUGENE, Ore. -- (Oct. 10, 2008) -- In the first three days of the country's economic meltdown that began Sept. 29, 81 percent of Americans surveyed in a national poll agreed or strongly agreed that the financial crisis "poses a greater threat to the quality of my life than does the threat of terrorism." And researchers found little trust in the government and even less in business leaders.

EVANSTON, Ill. --- "Is Barack Obama Black or Biracial?" a recent CNN.com headline asks.

The question of whether Obama should be considered black or multiracial has been a concern of the media throughout the campaign.

Should such racial characterizations of people like Obama -- who have one black parent and one white parent -- really matter?

According to a new Northwestern University study, they do matter.

Abdominal venous thrombosis may present as BCS or SVT. Hereditary and acquired risk factors have been implicated in the etiopathogenesis of abdominal venous thrombosis. Hereditary risk factors for thrombophilia include Factor V Leiden gene mutation, Prothrombin gene mutation, homozygous methyl tetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) gene mutation and deficiencies of coagulation inhibitor Protein C, Protein S and Antithrombin III. There are few studies from South Asian region which have comprehensively evaluated prothrombotic risk factors in BCS and PVT.

Pregnancy and motherhood may make us all go a little gooey, but it's not turning mums' brains into mush, according to mental health researchers at The Australian National University.

The study – conducted by the Centre for Mental Health Research (CMHR) at ANU – suggests that despite fears mothers may have that pregnancy affects their cognitive functions, there is no evidence to suggest that is true. The findings have been released as part of Mental Health Week, which runs until tomorrow (Saturday).

A study by researchers at the UC Davis M.I.N.D. Institute has discovered an important clue to why children with autism spectrum disorders have trouble imitating others: They spend less time looking at the faces of people who are modeling new skills.

The study was conducted using high-technology eye-tracking headgear and software that measures with precision the point at which a child is looking when learning a task. Researchers used an actor to demonstrate a task on a computer screen.

Working with genetically engineered mice, researchers at Johns Hopkins have shown that daily doses of a standardized extract from the leaves of the ginkgo tree can prevent or reduce brain damage after an induced stroke.

The scientists, in a report published in Stroke, say their work lends support to other evidence that ginkgo biloba triggers a cascade of events that neutralizes free radicals known to cause cell death.