Brain

Intrusive, enduring, depressive thoughts are an ever-present part of daily life for people with depression. A first of its kind study from the Center for BrainHealth at The University of Texas at Dallas published earlier this year in the Journal of Affective Disorders shows that depressive thoughts are maintained for longer periods of time for people with depressed mood, and this extended duration may reduce the amount of information that these individuals can hold in their memory.

It's long been known that mood biases our judgments and perceptions, but this effect has usually been regarded as irrational or disadvantageous. A new theory published November 3 in Trends in Cognitive Sciences argues that mood draws on experiences and can, in fact, help us quickly adapt to changes in our environment. For example, experiencing unexpected gains on the stock market should improve a trader's mood. That positive mood may then cause the trader to take more risks, essentially helping her adapt more quickly to a market that is generally on the rise.

A content analysis of nearly 500 anti-vaccination websites found that over two-thirds used what they represented as scientific evidence to support the idea that vaccines are dangerous and nearly one-third contained anecdotes that reinforced the perception.

AUGUSTA, Ga. - The same lipid that helps algae swim toward the light also appears to enable one type of brain cell to keep cerebrospinal fluid moving, researchers report.

The lipid is ceramide, long known to help keep skin smooth, and now Medical College of Georgia researchers have found ceramide helps make and keep in motion hairlike projections called motile cilia found in algae and in brains.

WASHINGTON (Nov. 3, 2015) -- After a debate that has lasted more than 130 years, researchers at Georgetown University Medical Center have found that loss of speech from a stroke in the left hemisphere of the brain can be recovered on the back, right side of the brain. This contradicts recent notions that the right hemisphere interferes with recovery.

While the findings will likely not put an immediate end to the debate, they suggest a new direction in treatment.

Philadelphia, PA, November 3, 2015 - One of the most powerful predictors in neuropsychiatry is the epsilon 4 (ε4) allele of the apolipoprotein gene (APOE).

Individuals who carry this ε4 variant of APOE are at increased risk for developing Alzheimer's disease, early age of Alzheimer's disease onset, and more rapid progression of Alzheimer's disease symptoms. APOE ε4 has also been associated with atherosclerosis as well as cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease.

Empathy is a basic human ability. We often feel empathy toward and console others in distress. Is it possible for us to emphasize with humanoid robots? Since robots are becoming increasingly popular and common in our daily lives, it is necessary to understand our interaction with robots in social situations.

However, it is not clear how the human brain responds to robots in empathic situations.

Scientists have discovered a protein that helps map the edge of brain tumours more clearly so they show up on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, according to new research presented at the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) Cancer Conference in Liverpool* today.

The laboratory research, carried out in rats, could lead to clinical trials aimed at improving the accuracy of brain tumour treatment.

Identifying children with dyslexia as early as first grade couldnarrow or even close the achievement gap with typical readers,according to a new study by researchers at the University ofCalifornia, Davis, and Yale University.

The data indicate that it is no longer acceptable to wait until achild is in third grade or later before undertaking efforts toidentify or address dyslexia.

Putnam Valley, NY. (Nov. 2, 2015) - The use of meshed split skin autographs (SSGs) is a standard treatment for large, deep burns. However, serious scarring is often a result. In an effort to improve wound healing and reduce scarring, a team of researchers in The Netherlands tested a treatment technique on patients with serious, deep burns that employed SSGs along with autologous cultured proliferating epidermal cells (ECs) compared to SSGs alone.

Women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) have high levels of androgens in their blood, which has been assumed able to affect fetal development during pregnancy. An international team of researchers led from Karolinska Institutet in Sweden has now identified a hormonal mechanism that might explain why women with PCOS run a higher risk of developing symptoms of mental ill-health, such as anxiety and depression, in adulthood. The results, which are based on animal studies, are presented in the journal 'PNAS'.

HANOVER, N.H. - A new Dartmouth study sheds light on brain cells in our "inner GPS," which may improve understanding of memory loss and wandering behavior in people with Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative diseases.

The findings, which appear in the journal Current Biology, contribute to our understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying our ability to navigate our environment. A PDF is available on request.

We hate to ruin Thanksgiving, but a new report appearing in the Nov. 2015 issue of The FASEB Journal suggests that for some people, overindulgence at the dinner table or at snack time is enough to trigger signs of metabolic disease. Specifically, in some people just one high-calorie shake was enough to make people with metabolic disease worse, while in others, relatively short periods of overeating trigger the beginnings of metabolic disease.

(Philadelphia, PA) - Individuals with Down syndrome who survive into adulthood face the additional challenge of early-onset dementia, in which toxic amyloid plaques build up in the brain. The condition is strikingly similar to Alzheimer's disease, and as new work led by researchers at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University (LKSOM) shows, dementia in Down syndrome involves defects in a regulatory enzyme known as γ-secretase activating protein (GSAP), which also happens to malfunction in Alzheimer's disease.

By age 5 children have a sense of self-esteem comparable in strength to that of adults, according to a new study by University of Washington researchers.

Because self-esteem tends to remain relatively stable across one's lifespan, the study suggests that this important personality trait is already in place before children begin kindergarten.

"Our work provides the earliest glimpse to date of how preschoolers sense their selves," said lead author Dario Cvencek, a research scientist at the UW's Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences (I-LABS).