Nanosensors are incredible information-gathering tools for myriad applications, including molecular targets such as the brain. Neurotransmitter molecules govern brain function through chemistry found deep within the brain, so University of California, Berkeley researchers are developing nanosensors to gain a better understanding of exactly how this all plays out. During the AVS 64th…
Scientists drilling down to the molecular roots of Alzheimer’s disease have encountered a good news/bad news scenario. A major player is a gene called TREM2, mutations of which can substantially raise a person’s risk of the disease. The bad news is that in the early stages of the disease, high-risk TREM2 variants can hobble the immune system’s ability to protect the brain from amyloid beta,…
People with both high and low levels of magnesium in their blood may have a greater risk of developing dementia, according to a study published in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Scientists have helped provide a way to better understand how to enable drugs to enter the brain and how cancer cells make it past the blood brain barrier.
Brain scientists from Edinburgh have identified a genetic programme that controls the way our brain changes throughout life. The programme controls how and when brain genes are expressed at different times in a person’s life to perform a range of functions, the study found.
Recent outbreaks of Zika virus have revealed that the virus causes brain defects in unborn children. But researchers from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and the University of California, San Diego report that the virus could eventually be used to target and kill cancer cells in the brain.
A team of biologists has found an unexpected source for the brain’s development, a finding that offers new insights into the building of the nervous system.
Columbia University Medical Center researchers have found that it may be possible to access memories “lost” to Alzheimer’s disease, if their discoveries about memory loss in mice also apply to people with the disease.
A largely aged population is already a reality in some countries, and this will become a worldwide problem by 2047, when the number of the Earth’s old people is likely to surpass the number of young people.
Experts say that one-third of the world’s dementia cases could be prevented by managing lifestyle factors such as hearing loss, hypertension and depression.
The fourth World Brain Day (July 22) revolves around stroke – how to detect it, how to prevent it, how to treat it. Raad Shakir, president of the World Federation of Neurology (WFN), seizes the opportunity to raise awareness about a disease that is becoming more common globally – but also preventable to a large extent.
The Alzheimer's Association announced the launch of a $20 million U.S. two-year clinical trial to test the ability of a multi-dimensional lifestyle intervention to prevent cognitive decline and dementia in 2,500 older adults with no current cognitive symptoms but who are at increased risk for later cognitive decline. The announcement was made at the 2017 Alzheimer's Association International…
An antibiotic used mostly to treat acne has been found to improve the quality of life for people with major depression, in a clinical trial from Deakin University.
New research has uncovered compelling evidence that genetics plays a major role in how children look at the world and whether they have a preference for gazing at people’s eyes and faces or at objects. The discovery by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta adds new detail to understanding the causes of autism…
Persons suffering from schizophrenia have a different perception of time than healthy individuals, a new study finds. There is far more variation in the way that a time interval is perceived by people with schizophrenic disorders than by those who do not have the condition. Patients with schizophrenia are also less precise when it comes to judging the temporal order of events.
Researchers have taken an in-depth look at the function of a gene that may be linked to the development of major depression. Their findings show that its activity levels might determine our susceptibility to stress and negative stimuli.
Keeping score is a common method of motivation. But new research shows that even if the score itself has no inherent meaning, it can serve as an effective motivator, as long as the score is accelerating.
By 2040, there will be over 1.2 million people living with dementia in England and Wales, an increase of 57 per cent from 2016. The rise is largely due to increased life expectancy say researchers in The BMJ today.
Canadian researchers have invented an intraoperative probe that reliably detects multiple types of tumour cells.
Your cognitive capacity is significantly reduced when your smartphone is within reach — even if it’s off. That’s the takeaway finding from a new study from the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin.
Scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), in collaboration with colleagues from Heidelberg University Hospital, have been able to visualize brain cancer using a novel MRI method. They use a simple sugar solution instead of conventional contrast agents, which can have side effects in the body.
Long before symptoms of Alzheimer's disease become apparent to patients and their families, biological changes are occurring within the brain. Amyloid plaques, which are clusters of protein fragments, along with tangles of protein known as tau, form in the brain and grow in number, eventually getting in the way of the brain's ability to function. These biological changes can be detected early in…
All cancer tumors have one thing in common – they must feed themselves to grow and spread, a difficult feat since they are usually in a tumor microenvironment with limited nutrients and oxygen. A study at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center has revealed new details about how an enzyme called acetyl-CoA synthetase 2 (ACSS2) allows brain tumors to grow despite their harsh…
The human brain is much better than previously thought at discovering and avoiding disease, a new study led by researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden reports. Our sense of vision and smell alone are enough to make us aware that someone has a disease even before it breaks out. And not only aware - we also act upon the information and avoid sick people.
For the first time, researchers of the University of Zurich and Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich have demonstrated the causal context of why deep sleep is important to the learning efficiency of the human brain. They have developed a new, non-invasive method for modulating deep sleep in humans in a targeted region of the brain.