Brain

Bottom Line: A diagnosis of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in older adults was associated with increased risk for mild cognitive impairment (MCI), especially MCI of skills other than memory, and the greatest risk was among patients who had COPD for more than five years.

Author: Balwinder Singh, M.D., M.S., of the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn., and colleagues.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A new study of math anxiety shows how some people may be at greater risk to fear math not only because of negative experiences, but also because of genetic risks related to both general anxiety and math skills.

The study, which examined how fraternal and identical twins differ on measures of math anxiety, provides a revised view on why some children – and adults – may develop a fear of math that makes it more difficult for them to solve math problems and succeed in school.

Researchers part-funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC) have shown that, contrary to what was previously assumed, suppressing unwanted memories reduces their unconscious influences on subsequent behaviour, and have shed light on how this process happens in the brain.

A new study offers evidence that simple and inexpensive changes to existing courses can help students learn more effectively.

The study from Rice University and Duke University found that making a few changes to homework assignments in an upper-level undergraduate engineering course at Rice led to improved scores on exams. The study appears this week in the journal Educational Psychology Review.

There is "significant" potential for organ donation to be made from among UK newborns, reveals research published online in the Fetal & Neonatal Edition of the Archives of Disease in Childhood.

But it is going untapped because of current guidelines on the definition of brainstem death, which run counter to those used by many other developed countries, say the authors.

DALLAS, March 17, 2014 — Brain sensors and electronic tags that dissolve. Boosting the potential of renewable energy sources. These are examples of the latest research from two pioneering scientists selected as this year's Kavli lecturers at the 247th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world's largest scientific society.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — One in eight visits to a a doctor for a headache or migraine end up with the patient going for a brain scan, at a total cost of about $1 billion a year, a new University of Michigan Medical School study finds.

And many of those MRI and CT scans – and costs – are probably unnecessary, given the very low odds that serious issues lurk in the patients' brains.

ANN ARBOR—University of Michigan researchers have learned how to fix a cellular structure called the Golgi that mysteriously becomes fragmented in all Alzheimer's patients and appears to be a major cause of the disease.

They say that understanding this mechanism helps decode amyloid plaque formation in the brains of Alzheimer's patients—plaques that kills cells and contributes to memory loss and other Alzheimer's symptoms.

The researchers discovered the molecular process behind Golgi fragmentation, and also developed two techniques to 'rescue' the Golgi structure.

Providing free drinking water in schools could be key to helping people in developing countries lift themselves out of poverty according to research from the University of East Anglia (UEA).

Research published today shows that schools providing clean water report fewer children off sick. It is the first study to investigate whether providing drinking water in schools can reduce absenteeism.

SAN FRANCISCO, March 14, 2014 – Children and adolescents older than age 8 at the onset of type 1 diabetes had weaker brain connectivity when tested later in life relative to those who had earlier ages of diagnosis, University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences researchers discovered.

The findings, presented today at the American Psychosomatic Society's annual meeting, were made by analyzing the brain scans of 44 middle-age adults diagnosed with type 1 diabetes as children.

Research from the University of Adelaide has confirmed that a gene linked to intellectual disability is critical to the earliest stages of the development of human brains.

Known as USP9X, the gene has been investigated by Adelaide researchers for more than a decade, but in recent years scientists have begun to understand its particular importance to brain development.

According to George Bernard Shaw, "Imitation is not just the sincerest form of flattery – it's the sincerest form of learning." According to psychologists, imitation is something that we all do whenever we learn a new skill, whether it is dancing or how to behave in specific social situations.

Technology now allows us to read facial expressions and identify which of the seven universal emotions a person is feeling: fear, anger, joy, sadness, disgust, surprise, or suspicion. This is very useful in video game development, medicine, marketing, and, perhaps less obviously, in driver safety. We know that in addition to fatigue, the emotional state of the driver is a risk factor.

The study found that children as young as four and five can understand that the human body works to keep us alive. The researchers call this a 'life theory' and say it is important because it enables children to understand other related biological facts, such as what the vital organs do to keep us alive and what happens when people die. The results also have implications for teaching about the human body in schools.

Mexican-Americans had worse neurologic, functional and cognitive outcomes 90 days after stroke compared to non-Hispanic whites, in a study reported in the American Heart Association journal Stroke.

Mexican-Americans have increased stroke risk, but lower risk of death compared to non-Hispanic whites. The new research suggests that prolonged survival is at the expense of increased disability.