Brain

When one encounters a group of fruit flies invading their kitchen, it probably appears as if the whole group is vying for a sweet treat. But a closer look would likely reveal the male flies in the group are putting up more of a fight, particularly if ripe fruit or female flies are present. According to the latest studies from the fly laboratory of California Institute of Technology (Caltech) biologist David Anderson, male Drosophilae, commonly known as fruit flies, fight more than their female counterparts because they have special cells in their brains that promote fighting.

Amsterdam, NL, 16 January 2014 – Research by a team of investigators in Finland suggests that the free recall memory deficits common even in early stages Parkinson's disease (PD) are related to structural changes in the brain, specifically parietal cortical gray matter volume. Their findings are published in the current issue of the Journal of Parkinson's Disease.

Amsterdam, NL, 16 January 2014 – A new study exploring vitamin D levels in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) opens up the possibility of a new avenue of early intervention that may delay or prevent the onset of cognitive impairment and depression. The findings are published in the Journal of Parkinson's Disease.

A new study found that children who were bullied during P.E. class or other physical activities were less likely to participate in physical activity one year later.

Overweight or obese children who experienced teasing during physical activity had a lower perceived health-related quality of life (referring to physical, social, academic and emotional functioning) one year later. Even children with a healthy weight who were bullied during physical activity tended to exercise less often one year later.

BUFFALO, N.Y. – The estimated 9 percent of college students who have symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are likely to drink more alcohol than peers without the psychological condition. In turn, heavy alcohol consumption exacerbates their PTSD symptoms over time, prolonging a vicious cycle.

These are the conclusions of the first empirical study to examine the bidirectional influences of the two phenomena, influences that had been theorized but never tested.

No machine is better at recognizing patterns in nature than the human brain. It takes mere seconds to recognize the order in a flock of birds flying in formation, schooling fish, or an army of a million marching ants. But computer analyses of collective animal behavior are limited by the need for constant tracking and measurement data for each individual; hence, the mechanics of social animal interaction are not fully understood.

Memories of traumatic events often last a lifetime because they are so difficult to treat through behavioral approaches. A preclinical study in mice published by Cell Press January 16th in the journal Cell reveals that drugs known as histone deacetylase inhibitors (HDACis) can enhance the brain's ability to permanently replace old traumatic memories with new memories, opening promising avenues for the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other anxiety disorders.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass-- Nearly 8 million Americans suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a condition marked by severe anxiety stemming from a traumatic event such as a battle or violent attack.

Many patients undergo psychotherapy designed to help them re-experience their traumatic memory in a safe environment so as to help them make sense of the events and overcome their fear. However, such memories can be so entrenched that this therapy doesn't always work, especially when the traumatic event occurred many years earlier.

Cold Spring Harbor, NY – Chandelier cells are neurons that use their unique shape to act like master circuit breakers in the brain's cerebral cortex. These cells have dozens, often hundreds, of branching axonal projections – output channels from the cell body of the neuron – that lend the full structure of a chandelier-like appearance. Each of those projections extends to a nearby excitatory neuron. The unique structure allows just one inhibitory chandelier cell to block or modify the output of literally hundreds of other cells at one time.

DURHAM, N.C. -- When listening to someone speak, we also rely on lip-reading and gestures to help us understand what the person is saying.

To link these sights and sounds, the brain has to know where each stimulus is located so it can coordinate processing of related visual and auditory aspects of the scene. That's how we can single out a conversation when it's one of many going on in a room.

Amsterdam, January 16, 2014 – A review and update of a controversial 20-year-old theory of consciousness published in Physics of Life Reviews claims that consciousness derives from deeper level, finer scale activities inside brain neurons. The recent discovery of quantum vibrations in "microtubules" inside brain neurons corroborates this theory, according to review authors Stuart Hameroff and Sir Roger Penrose.

This news release is available in German.

How do we come to recognize expertise in another person and integrate new information with our prior assessments of that person's ability? The brain mechanisms underlying these sorts of evaluations—which are relevant to how we make decisions ranging from whom to hire, whom to marry, and whom to elect to Congress—are the subject of a new study by a team of neuroscientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).

If we've learned anything from post-apocalyptic movies it's that computers eventually become self-aware and try to eliminate humans.

BYU engineer Dah-Jye Lee isn't interested in that development, but he has managed to eliminate the need for humans in the field of object recognition. Lee has created an algorithm that can accurately identify objects in images or video sequences without human calibration.

A new study by scientists at McGill University and the University of Zurich shows a direct link between metabolism in brain cells and their ability to signal information. The research may explain why the seizures of many epilepsy patients can be controlled by a specially formulated diet.