Brain

PITTSBURGH -Researchers, including Carnegie Mellon University President Subra Suresh and collaborators Tony Jun Huang from the Pennsylvania State University and Ming Dao from MIT, have demonstrated that acoustic tweezers can be used to non-invasively move and manipulate single cells along three dimensions, providing a promising new method for 3-D bioprinting. Their findings are published in this week's issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

January 25, 2016 -- For older adults, driving a car is an important aspect of having control over one's life. While 81 percent of the 29.5 million U.S. adults aged 65 and over continue to hold a license and get behind the wheel, age-related declines in cognition and physical function make driving more difficult, and many seniors reduce or eventually stop driving altogether. Researchers at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health examined the health and well-being of older adults after they stopped driving and found that their health worsened in a variety of ways.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. --Researchers at University of Florida Health have discovered the mechanics of how dopamine transports into and out of brain cells, a finding that could someday lead to more effective treatment of drug addictions and neurological disorders such as Parkinson's disease.

The researchers, including Habibeh Khoshbouei, Pharm D., Ph.D., an associate professor of neuroscience in the UF College of Medicine, report their findings in the current edition of the journal Nature Communications, published today (Jan. 25).

Why did some species, such as humans and dolphins, evolve large brains relative to the size of their bodies? Why did others, such as blue whales and hippos, evolve to have brains that, compared to their bodies, are relatively puny?

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (Jan. 25, 2016) - Whitehead Institute researchers have created a new mouse-human modeling platform that could be used to study neural crest development as well as the modeling of a variety of diseases, including such cancers as melanoma and neurofibromatosis.

TU Dresden is listed with five designations and thus, represents one of the leading German universities among the "World's Most Influential Scientific Minds".

Jan. 25, 2016, New York, NY and Stockholm, Sweden - Neuroblastoma is the third most common type of tumour in children. Its aggressive nature and the frequency of metastatic disease at diagnosis contribute to the fact that neuroblastoma accounts for almost 15 per cent of childhood cancer fatalities. For the past two decades a region on chromosome 1 that is often missing in neuroblastoma cells has been thought to harbour an important tumour suppressor gene.

FRANKFURT. Social difficulties are one of the main problems for children and adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Especially when their intelligence is unaffected, they become more and more conscious in the course of their development of the fact that they are different. In the framework of group therapy developed at Goethe University Frankfurt, children and adolescents with high functioning ASD can learn how to cope better in the social world and also achieve a lasting effect.

Sugar's sweetness and calorie content combine to give it lethal power to destroy diets, many scientists have assumed. However, new study by Yale University researchers says the brain responds to taste and calorie counts in fundamentally different ways. And only one of these responses explains why most New Years' resolutions have already disappeared under a deluge of Boston Crème Pies.

It's the brain's desire for calories -- not sweetness -- that dominates our desire for sugars, according to the study appearing Jan. 25, 2016 in the journal Nature Neuroscience.

Wearing a helmet in an effort to stay safe is likely to increase sensation seeking and could conversely make us less safe and more inclined to take risks, according to a significant new study from researchers at the University of Bath.

The latest findings call into question the effectiveness of certain safety advice, notably in relation to helmets for various leisure activities, including for cycling. But, the researchers suggest, the conclusions have wider-reaching implications in other contexts too, potentially even for decision making on the battlefield.

New research by University of Liverpool health expert Dr Emma Boyland has confirmed that unhealthy food advertising does increase food intake in children.

A well-known songbird, the great tit, has revealed its genetic code, offering researchers new insight into how species adapt to a changing planet. Their initial findings suggest that epigenetics -- what's on rather than what's in the gene -- may play a key role in the evolution of memory and learning. And that's not just true for birds. An international research team led by the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW) and Wageningen University will publish these findings in Nature Communications on Monday.

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- From gene mapping to space exploration, humanity continues to generate ever-larger sets of data -- far more information than people can actually process, manage, or understand.

Machine learning systems can help researchers deal with this ever-growing flood of information. Some of the most powerful of these analytical tools are based on a strange branch of geometry called topology, which deals with properties that stay the same even when something is bent and stretched every which way.

MAYWOOD, Ill. - A study by researchers at Loyola University Medical Center and Loyola University Chicago is providing new evidence that the vast majority of babies who are born with severe brain damage are not the result of mismanaged deliveries.

Lead author Jonathan Muraskas, MD, and colleagues examined the medical records of 32 full-term infants who developed severe cerebral palsy and mental retardation. The records indicate that this brain damage occurred after the babies were born, and despite proper resuscitation.

ANN ARBOR -- For female gelada monkeys, a grunt from a male primate won't suffice to get her attention. The call of the wild must involve moans, wobbles or yawns to entice these females, according to a new University of Michigan study involving the Ethiopian mammals.

In findings appearing in Scientific Reports, U-M researchers found that female geladas who heard recorded playbacks of male vocal sequences containing one of three derived call types -- moans, wobbles and yawns--lingered longer and spent more time near the speaker.