Brain

STANFORD, Calif. - An alarming number of adolescents already battling eating disorders are also intentionally cutting themselves, and health-care providers may be failing to diagnose many instances of such self-injury, according to a new study from Stanford University School of Medicine and Lucile Packard Children's Hospital.

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - A study by researchers at Purdue University suggests that some high school football players suffer undiagnosed changes in brain function and continue playing even though they are impaired.

In a study that sheds new light on the causes of Parkinson's disease, researchers report that brain cells in Parkinson's patients abandon their energy-producing machinery, the mitochondria. A shutdown in fuel can have devastating effects on brain cells, which consume roughly 20 percent of the body's energy despite making up only 2 percent of body weight.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- By creating a better way to see molecules at work in living brain cells, researchers affiliated with MIT's Picower Institute for Learning and Memory and the MIT Department of Chemistry are helping elucidate molecular mechanisms of synapse formation. These studies could also help further understanding of how synapses go awry in developmental diseases such as autism and Fragile X syndrome. The study will appear in the Oct. 7 issue of Cell.

Witnessing a person from our own group or an outsider suffer pain causes neural responses in two very different regions of the brain. And, the specific region activated reveals whether or not we will help the person in need. Researchers at the University of Zurich studied the brain responses of soccer fans and now have neurobiological evidence for why we are most willing to help members of our own group.

INDIANAPOLIS –A new study from the School of Science at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis looks at how much African Americans and whites favor or prefer their own racial group over the other, how much they identify with their own racial group, and how positively they feel about themselves.

In a study that sheds new light on the causes of Parkinson's disease, researchers report that brain cells in Parkinson's patients abandon their energy-producing machinery, the mitochondria. A shutdown in fuel can have devastating effects on brain cells, which consume roughly 20 percent of the body's energy despite making up only 2 percent of body weight.

LA JOLLA, CA-By comparing a clearly defined visual input with the electrical output of the retina, researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies were able to trace for the first time the neuronal circuitry that connects individual photoreceptors with retinal ganglion cells, the neurons that carry visuals signals from the eye to the brain.

STANFORD, Calif. — With the help of tiny, see-through fish, Stanford University School of Medicine researchers are homing in on what happens in the brain while you sleep. In a new study, they show how the circadian clock and sleep affect the scope of neuron-to-neuron connections in a particular region of the brain, and they identified a gene that appears to regulate the number of these connections, called synapses.

A new study reveals that brain signals elicited by the sight of someone suffering pain differ as a function of whether we identify positively or negatively with that person and that these differential brain signals predict a later decision to help or withdraw from helping. The research, published by Cell Press in the October 7th issue of the journal Neuron, provides fascinating insight into the neural mechanisms involved in decisions that benefit others, known as prosocial behavior, and how they are modulated by perceived group membership.

Cells that help to protect the central nervous system may also contribute to pathological changes in the brain. New research, published by Cell Press in the October 7th issue of the journal Neuron, provides mechanistic insight into a link between the immune system and neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer's disease that are associated with abnormal accumulation of tau protein.

Washington, DC – People who have been blind from birth make use of the visual parts of their brain to refine their sensation of sound and touch, according to an international team of researchers led by neuroscientists at Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC).

Published today in the journal Neuron, the scientists say this finding helps explain why the blind have such advanced perception of these senses – abilities that far exceed people who can see, they say.

Barred for up to ten years from receiving research grants from the Swedish Research Council. There will be serious consequences for the few researchers who are guilty of plagiarism, falsification, or inventing results.

"We need to be able to rely on research findings," says Pär Omling, Director General of the Swedish Research Council.