Brain

Stem cells from adult schizophrenia patients form new proteins more slowly than those from healthy people, according to new research.

The findings are enhancing understanding of how schizophrenia affects the workings of the brain, and open the way to new approaches for future drug therapies.

In the era of big data, data can often be obtained abundantly and cheaply, but providing labels for these large-scale data has always been a challenge because labeling data is expensive and time-consuming. For example, if we want to train a model for annotating the image automatically, learning algorithms need many images with known annotations as training data. Although there are large amounts of images in the internet, specialists must be hired to annotate the images as training data.

Screening for asymptomatic atrial fibrillation (AF) in people aged 65 and over and treating it with anticoagulant medications could greatly reduce the risk of stroke and premature death, say cardiologists in today's Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

AF is a very common abnormal heart rhythm that poses the risk of blood clots forming inside the heart. When clots break off they usually travel to the brain, causing severe strokes.

Orlando, Fla - Researchers at Orlando Health have developed a blood test that can detect even the most subtle signs of a concussion in children, correctly identifying the presence of traumatic brain injuries 94 percent of the time in a recent study.

Science has long dictated that brains don't fossilize, so when Nicholas Strausfeld co-authored the first ever report of a fossilized brain in a 2012 edition of Nature, it was met with "a lot of flack."

"It was questioned by many paleontologists, who thought - and in fact some claimed in print - that maybe it was just an artifact or a one-off, implausible fossilization event," said Strausfeld, a Regents' professor in UA's Department of Neuroscience.

The earlier bystanders can deliver shocks with an automated external defibrillator (AED) to people who have cardiac arrest outside the hospital, the better their chances are for survival. Although it may be difficult to find community-based AEDs, a new smartphone application helps connect rescuers with lifesaving AEDs and victims with sudden cardiac arrest, according to research presented at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions 2015.

It used to be enough to call a serotonergic neuron a serotonergic neuron.

These brain cells make the neurotransmitter serotonin, which helps regulate mood, appetite, breathing rate, body temperature and more.

Recently, however, scientists have begun to learn that these neurons differ from one another--and that the differences likely matter in dysfunction and disease.

A team led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators has reported the first successful use of a targeted therapy drug to treat a patient with a debilitating, recurrent brain tumor. In a paper published online in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the researchers report that treatment with the BRAF inhibitor dabrafinib led to shrinkage of a BRAF-mutant craniopharyngioma that had recurred even after four surgical procedures.

New research from the University of Waterloo debunks the age-old moral philosophy that if you are unable to do something, then you are not morally obligated to do it.

Professor John Turri and postdoctoral researcher Wesley Buckwalter of the Department of Philosophy at Waterloo investigated the link between being morally obligated to do something and having the ability to do it. Traditional philosophical wisdom says that "ought implies can." However, their recent study found that people routinely attribute moral obligations to people who cannot fulfill them.

November 6, 2015, New York, NY. In real-world settings, patients with schizophrenia whose symptoms do not respond to standard antipsychotic medications have better outcomes if they are switched to clozapine instead of another standard antipsychotic. They have fewer hospitalizations, stay on the new medication longer, and are less likely to need to use additional antipsychotics. These findings were published today in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

Citing the "tremendous potential" of research on human stem cells in nonhuman embryos, scientists and a bioethicist from the Stanford University School of Medicine have co-authored a letter urging the removal of funding restrictions imposed on such research last month by the National Institutes of Health.

The complexity of the neural activity we use to process visual images reflects the intricacy of those images, a team of New York University scientists has found. Their study offers new insights into how our brain extracts information about our natural surroundings from the light captured by our eyes.

Neuroscientists at Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science have discovered that some neurons are joiners -- seemingly eager to link-up with networks in which learning is taking place.

The findings, which will appear this week in the journal Current Biology, have implications for how brain networks can rapidly adjust to build memories.

Salmon migrating from the open ocean to inland waters do more than swim upstream. To navigate the murkier freshwater streams and reach a spot to spawn, the fish have evolved a means to enhance their ability to see infrared light. Humans lack this evolutionary adaptation.

Many families believe religion plays an essential role in childhood moral development. But children of religious parents may not be as altruistic as those parents think, according to a new international study from the University of Chicago published Nov. 5 in Current Biology.

A team of developmental psychologists led by Prof. Jean Decety examined the perceptions and behavior of children in six countries. The study assessed the children's tendency to share--a measure of their altruism--and their inclinationto judge and punish others for bad behavior.