Brain

MADISON — A new study in animals shows that using a compound to block the body's immune response greatly reduces disability after a stroke.

Whether you're a Major League outfielder chasing down a hard-hit ball or a lesser mortal navigating a busy city sidewalk, it pays to keep a close watch on your surroundings when walking or running. Now, new research by UC San Francisco neuroscientists suggests that the body may get help in these fast-changing situations from a specialized brain circuit that causes visual system neurons to fire more strongly during locomotion.

In a series of experiments sparked by fruit flies that couldn't sleep, Johns Hopkins researchers say they have identified a mutant gene — dubbed "Wide Awake" — that sabotages how the biological clock sets the timing for sleep. The finding also led them to the protein made by a normal copy of the gene that promotes sleep early in the night and properly regulates sleep cycles.

Your brain's ability to instantly link what you see with what you do is down to a dedicated information 'highway', suggests new UCL-led research.

For the first time, researchers from UCL (University College London) and Cambridge University have found evidence of a specialized mechanism for spatial self-awareness that combines visual cues with body motion.

Scientists have uncovered how inflammation and lack of oxygen conspire to cause brain damage in conditions such as stroke and Alzheimer's disease.

The discovery, published today in Neuron, brings researchers a step closer to finding potential targets to treat neurodegenerative disorders.

Chronic inflammation and hypoxia, or oxygen deficiency, are hallmarks of several brain diseases, but little was known about how they contribute to symptoms such as memory loss.

In order to function properly, the human brain requires the ability not only to store but also to forget: Through memory loss, unnecessary information is deleted and the nervous system retains its plasticity. A disruption of this process can lead to serious mental disorders. Basel scientists have now discovered a molecular mechanism that actively regulates the process of forgetting. The renowned scientific journal "Cell" has published their results.

Before I left the house this morning, I let the cat out and started the dishwasher. Or was that yesterday? Very often, our memories must distinguish not just what happened and where, but when an event occurred — and what came before and after. New research from the University of California, Davis, Center for Neuroscience shows that a part of the brain called the hippocampus stores memories by their "temporal context" — what happened before, and what came after.

Philadelphia, PA, March 13, 2014 – Only one third of individuals identified as being at clinical high risk for psychosis actually convert to a psychotic disorder within a 3 year follow-up period. This risk assessment is based on the presence of sub-threshold psychotic-like symptoms.

Thus, clinical symptom criteria alone do not predict future psychosis risk with sufficient accuracy to justify aggressive early intervention, especially with medications such as antipsychotics that produce significant side effects.

There is a significant deficit in recognition and control of hypertension in the Hispanic population of the United States, according to a new study published in American Journal of Hypertension (AJH).

A rare and potentially lethal disease of newborn babies whose bodies make too much insulin may be treatable with fish oils, according to researchers from The University of Manchester.

STANFORD, Calif. — When initiated soon after menopause, hormone therapy with estradiol prevented degeneration in key brain regions of women who were at heightened dementia risk, according to a new study led by Stanford University School of Medicine researchers.

PHILADELPHIA— People who try to quit smoking often say that kicking the habit makes the voice inside telling them to light up even louder, but why people succumb to those cravings so often has never been fully understood.

COLUMBIA, Mo. – When use of a dominant hand is lost by amputation or stroke, a patient is forced to compensate by using the nondominant hand exclusively for precision tasks like writing or drawing. Presently, the behavioral and neurological effects of chronic, forced use of the nondominant hand are largely understudied and unknown. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri have shed light on ways in which a patient compensates when losing a dominant hand and suggest new and improved rehabilitation techniques for those suffering from amputation or stroke.

(Washington, DC) – A new study reveals that four-to-seven-year-old children rely on the sounds of new nouns more than on their meaning when assigning them to noun classes, even though the meaning is more predictive of noun class in the adult language. This finding reveals that children's sensitivity to their linguistic environment does not line up with objective measures of informativity, highlighting the active role that children play in selecting the data from which they learn language.

Mutations within the gene FTO have been implicated as the strongest genetic determinant of obesity risk in humans, but the mechanism behind this link remained unknown. Now, an international team of scientists has discovered that the obesity-associated elements within FTO interact with IRX3, a distant gene on the genome that appears to be the functional obesity gene. The FTO gene itself appears to have only a peripheral effect on obesity. The study appears online March 12 in Nature.