Brain

(PHILADELPHIA) - Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, is a neurodegenerative disease that primarily kills motor neurons, leading to paralysis and death 2 to 5 years from diagnosis. Currently ALS has no cure. Despite promising early-stage research, the majority of drugs in development for ALS have failed. Now researchers have uncovered a possible explanation.

A lot of research has shown that poor regulation of the serotonin system, caused by certain genetic variations, can increase the risk of developing psychiatric illnesses such as autism, depression, or anxiety disorders. Furthermore, genetic variations in the components of the serotonin system can interact with stress experienced during the foetal stages and/or early childhood, which can also increase the risk of developing psychiatric problems later on.

MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, Mass-- Tufts University School of Engineering researchers and collaborators from Texas A&M University have published the first research to use computational modeling to predict and identify the metabolic products of gastrointestinal (GI) tract microorganisms. Understanding these metabolic products, or metabolites, could influence how clinicians diagnose and treat GI diseases, as well as many other metabolic and neurological diseases increasingly associated with compromised GI function.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Scientists have created video games that add an important element of fun to the repetitive training needed to improve vision in people - including adults - with a lazy eye and poor depth perception.

The training tools, including a Pac-Man-style "cat and mouse" game and a "search for oddball" game, have produced results in pilot testing: Weak-eye vision improved to 20/20 and 20/50 in two adult research participants with lazy eyes whose vision was 20/25 and 20/63, respectively, before the training began.

Nanosymposium 18.10 Sat., 3:15 p.m., Walter E. Washington Convention Center, 150ALindsay Hayes and Akira Sawa

A Blood Pressure Hormone Implicated in Psychosis

The first issue of a new publication series from The Gerontological Society of America (GSA) called From Policy to Practice explores pain as a public health problem and takes a look at how various policies impact the care provided to patients in a range of practice settings. It also provides readers with an overview of provisions of the Affordable Care Act that address pain research, education, training, and clinical care -- as well as steps taken to implement those provisions.

A new study in mice, conducted by researchers at Sweden's Karolinska Institutet together with colleagues in Singapore and the United States, shows that our natural gut-residing microbes can influence the integrity of the blood-brain barrier, which protects the brain from harmful substances in the blood. According to the authors, the findings provide experimental evidence that our indigenous microbes contribute to the mechanism that closes the blood-brain barrier before birth. The results also support previous observations that gut microbiota can impact brain development and function.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - An antidepressant commonly prescribed for women with postpartum depression may restore connections between cells in brain regions that are negatively affected by chronic stress during pregnancy, new research suggests.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Youth who enter puberty ahead of their peers are at heightened risk of depression, although the disease develops differently in girls than in boys, a new study suggests.

Early maturation triggers an array of psychological, social-behavioral and interpersonal difficulties that predict elevated levels of depression in boys and girls several years later, according to research by led by psychology professor Karen D. Rudolph at the University of Illinois.

Attending to and caring about the emotions of employees and colleagues - that's for wimps, not for tough businesspeople and efficient performers, right? Wrong! An extensive international study has now shown: The "ability to recognize emotions" affects income. The corresponding author of the study is Professor Dr. Gerhard Blickle of the Department of Psychology at the University of Bonn. The results are published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior.

This news release is available in German.

Pregnant women with histories of major depression are about 40 percent less likely to relapse into depression if they practice mindfulness techniques--such as meditation, breathing exercises and yoga--along with cognitive therapy, according to a new study led by the University of Colorado Boulder.

Washington, D.C. - November 19, 2014 - Lumosity is presenting new research today at the 2014 Society for Neuroscience conference on how lifestyle factors such as sleep, mood and time of day impact cognitive gameplay performance. The study, titled "Estimating sleep, mood and time of day effects in a large database of human cognitive performance," analyzed over 60 million data points from 61,407 participants and found that memory, speed, and flexibility tasks peaked in the morning, while crystallized knowledge tasks such as arithmetic and verbal fluency peaked in the afternoon.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] -- A widely presumed problem of aging is that the brain becomes less flexible -- less plastic -- and that learning may therefore become more difficult. A new study led by Brown University researchers contradicts that notion with a finding that plasticity did occur in seniors who learned a task well, but it occurred in a different part of the brain than in younger people.

A new study, published online in Brain: A Journal of Neurology today, followed 43,368 individuals in Sweden for an average of 12.6 years to examine the impact of physical activity on Parkinson's disease risk. It was found that "a medium amount" of physical activity lowers the risk of Parkinson's disease.