Brain

Scientists have known for more than 40 years that the synthetic pesticide DDT is harmful to bird habitats and a threat to the environment.

Now researchers at Rutgers University say exposure to DDT – banned in the United States since 1972 but still used as a pesticide in other countries – may also increase the risk and severity of Alzheimer's disease in some people, particularly those over the age of 60.

Patients with Alzheimer's disease have significantly higher levels of DDE, the long-lasting metabolite of the pesticide DDT, in their blood than healthy people, a team of researchers has found.

In a case-control study involving 86 Alzheimer's patients and 79 healthy elderly controls, researchers found that DDE levels were almost four times higher in serum samples from Alzheimer's patients than in controls. Having DDE levels in the highest third of the range in the study increased someone's risk of Alzheimer's by a factor of four.

In normal development, all cells turn off genes they don't need, often by attaching a chemical methyl group to the DNA, a process called methylation. Historically, scientists believed methyl groups could only stick to a particular DNA sequence: a cytosine followed by a guanine, called CpG. But in recent years, they have been found on other sequences, and so-called non-CpG methylation has been found in stem cells, and in neurons in the brain.

MAYWOOD, Il. – The media have widely reported that a debilitating neurological condition called chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) is a well-established disease in retired athletes who played football and other contact sports. But a study by a Loyola University Medical Center neuropsychologist has found little evidence that CTE actually exists.

The number of serious traumatic spinal cord injuries is on the rise in the United States, and the leading cause no longer appears to be motor vehicle crashes, but falls, new Johns Hopkins research suggests.

The same research shows, moreover, that rates of these injuries — whose symptoms range from temporary numbness to full-blown paralysis — are rising fastest among older people, suggesting that efforts to prevent falls in the elderly could significantly curb the number of spinal injuries.

MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, Mass.–Can video and computer games teach college students how to be better community citizens? Educators and researchers at Tufts University's Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service hope so. They're developing and testing Civic Seed, an interactive video game created in collaboration with the Engagement Game Lab (EGL) at Emerson College, to see if it can better prepare college students to engage with the community—and if it can do so more effectively than a non-gaming alternative.

A new study led by Professor Bert De Smedt (Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, KU Leuven) has found that healthy 12-year-olds who score well in addition and multiplication have higher-quality white matter tracts. This correlation does not appear to apply to subtraction and division.

'Grey' cells process information in the brain and are connected via neural pathways, the tracts through which signals are transferred.

MANKATO, Minn. — Jan. 27, 2014 — For patients who have experienced a large stroke that cuts off blood supply to a large part of the brain, the use of standardized medical management protocol and surgery to decompress swelling can improve life expectancy, Mayo Clinic researchers found in a recent study.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – One of the few studies of its type has found that a startling 59 percent of college students at one Oregon university were "food insecure" at some point during the previous year, with possible implications for academic success, physical and emotional health and other issues.

West Orange, NJ. January 27, 2014. Stroke rehabilitation researchers at Kessler Foundation report an association between acute, severe spatial neglect post stroke and long-term recovery of mobility. This new study indicates that severity of spatial neglect during the acute inpatient rehabilitation for right brain stroke may predict functional mobility in the community after discharge.

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Every time you open your eyes, visual information flows into your brain, which interprets what you're seeing. Now, for the first time, MIT neuroscientists have noninvasively mapped this flow of information in the human brain with unique accuracy, using a novel brain-scanning technique.

The response of a patient with metastatic brain tumors to treatment with stereotactic radiosurgery in the first six-to-twelve weeks can indicate whether follow-up treatments and monitoring are necessary, according to research conducted at the University of North Carolina.

New Rochelle, NY, January 27, 2014—Building on previous evidence showing that religious belief involves cognitive activity that can be mapped to specific brain regions, a new study has found that causal, directional connections between these brain networks can be linked to differences in religious thought.

Alcohol use is more likely than marijuana use to lead to violence between partners, according to studies done at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

A biomarker widely used to diagnose brain injury has shown early promise for assessing the severity of heart inflammation, or myocarditis, find researchers at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins, and the Mayo Clinic.

The study is published online in the January issue of the Journal of Cardiovascular Translational Research.