Brain

Researchers have identified a new gene mutation linked to frontotemporal dementia, according to a study published in the July 10, 2007, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

A fat-derived protein known for its effects on the liver and skeletal muscle might also serve as an energy-conserving signal to the brain during periods of starvation, suggests a new study.

The substance, known as adiponectin, acts on the brain to boost appetite and slow energy expenditure in an effort to maintain adequate fat stores during lean times, the researchers report.

Women don't just like men with muscles — they go for them.

Men who are more muscular than average are much more likely to have short-term affairs and multiple sex partners than their scrawnier peers, according to new UCLA research published in the August issue of the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

A multi-institutional consortium including Duke University has created startlingly crisp 3-D microscopic views of tiny mouse brains -- unveiled layer by layer -- by extending the capabilities of conventional magnetic resonance imaging.

The disease that causes tremors, rigidity and slowed movements in a million Americans also targets another brain network that regulates cognitive thought and the ability to carry out everyday tasks.

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. Older adults showing signs of both conditions were seven-times more likely to develop Alzheimer’s than their peers.

Researchers at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) believe that blood may hold vital insights into what is happening in the brain of patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS).

In a study unparalleled in its scope, a team led by UNSW Professor Andrew Lloyd of the Centre for Infection and Inflammation Research, has studied the differences in gene expression patterns in the blood of people who either recover promptly after acute glandular fever or develop the prolonged illness called post-infective syndrome.

Scientists at Children’s National Medical Center have demonstrated conclusively that a specific protein is instrumental in myelination and remyelination, processes essential to the creation and repair of the brain’s white matter.

This groundbreaking discovery in mouse models points the way to developing treatments or interventions to enhance healthy brain development and/or brain disease repair in children and adults.

A role for prion proteins, the much debated agents of mad cow disease and vCJD, has been identified. It appears that the normal prions produced by the body help to prevent the plaques that build up in the brain to cause Alzheimer’s disease. The possible function for the mysterious proteins was discovered by a team of scientists led by Medical Research Council funded scientist Professor Nigel Hooper of the University of Leeds.

Salk Institute neurobiologists are beginning to tease apart the complex brain networks that enable humans and other higher mammals to fix our gaze on one object while independently directing attention to others - that pesky method mom used to always know you were doing something wrong when her back was turned.

Anybody who’s tried to concentrate on work while suffering a headache knows that pain compellingly commands attention—which is how evolution helped ensure survival in a painful world. Now, researchers have pinpointed the brain region responsible for pain’s ability to affect cognitive processing. They have found that this pain-related brain region is distinct from the one involved in cognitive processing interference due to a distracting memory task.

Scientists' hunt for the cause of depression has implicated so many suspects and found so many treatments with different mechanisms that the condition remains an enigma. Now researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have identified one unifying principle that could explain how a range of causes and treatments for depression converge.

Refuting the popular stereotype that females talk more than men, researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have found women and men both use an average of 16,000 words each day.

The psychology researchers have published their findings in “Are Women Really More Talkative Than Men"” in the July issue of Science.

For more than a decade, researchers have claimed that women use far more words each day than men. One set of numbers that is commonly tossed around is that women use 20,000 words per day compared to only 7,000 for men.

Differences in immune systems have been found in African Americans with multiple sclerosis (MS) compared to Caucasians, possibly offering a clue why African Americans experience more disability with MS than Caucasians, according to a study published in the July 3, 2007, issue of Neurology.

For the study, researchers compared levels of antibodies in the cerebrospinal fluid of 66 African Americans to 132 Caucasians with MS.

The study found antibody levels in the cerebrospinal fluid of African Americans with MS were 29 percent higher than levels found in affected Caucasians.

Fibrinogen, a blood-clotting protein found in circulating blood, has been found to inhibit the growth of central nervous system neuronal cells, a process that is necessary for the regeneration of the spinal cord after traumatic injury. The findings by researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine, may explain why the human body is unable to repair itself after most spinal cord injuries.